Church's Crusade
by St-Bazza
Summary: This is a Red Vs. Blue fanfic, set after episode 100. However it also assumes that the events of Reconstruction do not happen. This fic deals with Church's attempts to forget about the loss of Tex
1. Reminiscence

**Church's Crusade # 1: Reminiscence**

The walls shook and dust fell from the ceiling at another detonation from outside. The squad huddled in the ruins of the warehouse, waiting for the order to act, yet dreading the moment when they would be forced to break cover. Their sergeant watched them from a short distance away.

I'll have to do something soon, thought Church, as he looked on what was left of his team. He closed his eyes and looked back over the past few months, back to the day when it had all changed, the day it had all gone so horribly wrong. The day he had lost her.

For the first few days he had carried on as he always did, holding the Blues together in a myriad of different ways. It had kept him going for a while, a short return to what was almost normality. Yet now she was gone he no longer had something to focus on. Every little thing grated on his nerves until one day, after an incident with Tucker, Caboose, a misplaced rocket and the east wall off the base, he had finally snapped.

"THAT. IS. IT." he yelled, striding forward, and as Doc and Sister looked on, brought his fist around to connect with Tucker's helmet, sending the man sprawling, before rounding on Caboose. He was about to do the same to Caboose, but stopped himself as he remembered the enormous strength that the blue-armoured rookie easily kept hidden. Besides, Caboose was probably an innocent in this anyway. Instead, he turned and marched back to the base as Tucker pulled himself to his feet, and began to throw his gear into a pack. As he turned to walk to the exit, his way was barred by Tucker.

"What the hell did you do that for?"  
Church ignored him and tried to push past, but tucker shoved him back into the room. Church glared at him through the visor of his helmet and tried again. This met with the same results.  
"Church, where are you going?" The voice was that of Caboose, who was standing behind Tucker now. Even though he couldn't see his face, Church could imagine the look of innocent concern on the rookie's face.  
"Away Caboose. I'm going away for a while." He might be mad at Tucker, but he couldn't look Caboose in the eye.  
"What? Like fuck you are!" shouted Tucker. A moment later Caboose asked "Is this about the wall?"  
Church sighed, "No Caboose this isn't about the wall. I just need to forget about some things." He tried to leave, but again tucker blocked his path.  
"Get out of my way Tucker,' Church growled, 'I'm going whether you like it or not."  
"No. Not until we get some answers." Behind him Sister and Doc arrived.  
"Fuck! You of all people should understand. You lost your kid on that fucking ship. But you just go back to your life like nothings changed."  
"Tex? This is about Tex?,' Tucker stared at Church in disbelief, 'My god man why? O'Mally had her. She would have killed you if she got half a chance. Get over it. She's gone and she is not coming ba - WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?"  
Tucker stared in disbelief down the barrel of the pistol in Church's hand. Even Church was surprised.  
"I'm not going to say it again Tucker. Get out of my way."  
Tucker backed out of the doorway and glared at Church as he stepped into the hall, gun still trained on his old friend.  
"I'm sorry Tucker, but this is how it's gotta be,' he looked at the other members of the team, 'Goodbye." He turned and walked out the door of the base. As he stepped down the ramp to the open air he heard Tucker's voice.

"Good riddance..."

The characters Church, Caboose, Tucker, Simmons, Sarge, Grif, Sister, Donut and Doc are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions.


	2. Planning the hunt

**Church's Crusade #2: Planning the hunt**

"Sarge. Hey sergeant."

Church came back to reality with a start, his hand going immediately to his rifle before he realised the voice was addressing him. He almost laughed at that. Even after all the months away from Blood Gulch he still thought of Sarge as the dedicated, though rather incompetent leader of the Reds. With a sigh he looked up.

"What is it Eddie?" he said to the newest member of the squad. Eddie was a young recruit of about nineteen. His armour was hardly marked by the many firefights the squad had been involved in and he still had the easy, boyish enthusiasm of a new recruit.

"I just thought you should know, the guys out there with the guns, their getting kinda close."  
Church sighed again. "I'll go have a look. Get Rocky up here would you?"  
He got up and climbed to the gap in the wall were a look-out was posted. Anna was the only female member of the squad, but was invaluable all the same. With sharp eyes and good aim, she was one of the best snipers he had ever seen. She nodded to him as he approached, but said nothing. Church moved carefully up to the gap and looked out.  
He quickly counted twelve men moving across the rubble of the street. They held a variety of weapons and looked comfortably assured of victory. Church ducked out of site again and looked questioningly at Anna.

"Six with rifles, three with shotguns plus an officer with the same, two with rockets and two snipers back in the buildings." she said quickly.  
Church groaned quietly. Fourteen. Twice the number of his small band and with better positions. He looked out again as Corporal Rocky "The Rocket" Stone climbed up beside him. Church turned to him, "What do you think?"

Rocky licked his lips before replying, "I reckon we have a chance if Anna can deal with those snipers. I can take out a few of them with a rocket. But we are in a bad position. Rourke has some broken ribs and the Stevens boys have got injuries to their arms and legs respectively. Plus were down to our last four grenades and none of us has much in the way of ammunition. Chances are this could be our last fight."

Church nodded slowly, "Alright, I'll head out and see what I can do. When I give the word I want Anna to take out those snipers and you to do what you can about the riflemen. Get Eddie on the machine-gun. I'll see what I can do about the rockets. Remember, do nothing until I give the word."

They nodded, knowing better than to argue. Church rose and slid down the pile of rubble and relayed the orders to the others then slipped quietly out of the remains of the building. Stained with dust and smoke, his armour blended almost perfectly with the surrounding rubble, its original cobalt blue almost completely removed by scratching and repairs. You almost never saw armour of its quality anymore, he thought. In fact in the entire time he had served with this group, he had not seen one other soldier wearing anything similar. As he thought about that he idly reflected that he was in fact a much better soldier now than when he had been at Blood Gulch. But then that wasn't surprising. All he had done since he left was train, with any weapon available, as he tried to forget. After all that was why he was here, to forget.

He snapped out of his reverie as he rounded a corner and saw the backs of the rocket troopers. Silently, he drew his knife and crept up behind them…

The characters Church, Caboose, Tucker, Simmons, Sarge, Grif, Sister, Donut and Doc are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions.


	3. First strike

**Church's Crusade #3: First strike**

Church moved carefully so as not to disturb the rubble. The troopers were talking idly as they marched. Church slowed as he heard some of the words.

"...just plain scary if you ask me. Their forces were being destroyed easily. Then this new guy shows up and starts fighting like he's invulnerable, and with that armour of his and his squad behind him he practically is."  
"Anyone can be killed,' the other sneered, 'stop being such a coward."  
"I'm not a coward, I just think that we should be careful. I heard he is the ghost of some primeval warrior from the far past. And if the Captain is right and that is his squad in there you can bet were in for one hell of a fight."

Church didn't wait to hear more. He rose and stepped behind the trailing soldier, grabbed his uniform and pulled him back, then promptly slit his throat, he then rose as the other trooper turned at the gurgling cry of his comrade and back-handed his knife into his opponents neck. As the second trooper fell to the ground, Church used the increased strength of his robotic body, shouldered the two rocket launchers and spoke one word as he stepped around behind the other soldiers.

"Fire."

As he spoke he let loose with both weapons, then let them fall and drew his two SMGs and, as the sounds of gun fire came from the building where his squad was holed up, and his two rockets reached their target, opened fire. The enemy never knew what hit them. The three rockets struck simultaneously, killing seven of the soldiers instantly. One of the snipers died before he could even raise his weapon. The other managed to get of one shot as Anna's second shot passed through his ear. Church felt the bullet pass through his left hand, knocking one of his weapons away. He ducked behind cover and checked the damage to his hand. The bullet had almost removed one of his fingers. He would have to fix that later. He took out his last remaining grenade, pulled the pin, and rose with his gun in his undamaged hand. He saw a pair of enemy soldiers hiding behind a pile of rubble and the enemy captain a few yards away. Church hurled the grenade at the pair then brought his weapon to bear on the surprised officer. The captain managed to get of one shot at the advancing armoured figure, but stopped and looked in horror as the figure came on, black oil falling from the holes in his armour. Church aimed and fired, the bullets raking up the length of the captain's body as the gun's kickback began to pull at the weapon. As the officer's corpse hit the broken ground Church heard shots from his team's positions, and a moment later the radio crackled to life.

"Sir. Enemies attacking from behind our positions,' said Anna's voice, pain clearly evident, 'It was a ruse. They must have slipped through during the fight. Eddie's down and I've taken a shot to the arm. Rocky's holding them off, but I don't know about the others. We need help." The signal was suddenly lost, but not before Church heard an explosion and a hail of gun fire. Without further hesitation he grabbed up a fallen shotgun and began to run at top speed through the rubble, hoping he wasn't too late...

The characters Church, Caboose, Tucker, Simmons, Sarge, Grif, Sister, Donut and Doc are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions.


	4. Loss

**Church's Crusade #4: Loss**

As he neared the crumbling structure, Church began to think, "I'm charging into a battle against god knows how many people and I have no clue whether help is coming. I might die here,' he thought before the sarcastic voice at the back of his mind added, 'Again." Then he was through the wall and into the battle.

He took a quick look around, ducked as a rocket flew over his head then turned and ran at the advancing enemy, jumping into the midst of them, firing his shotgun as he went. Two soldiers went down in a moment and then he hit the group drawing his knife as he struck. One man went down as Church slashed his throat, another fell with the blade through his eye and a third died when Church wheeled and fired his weapon into his face. Then yanking the blade free, he turned on the last two, only to see them go down from shots to the back of the head and looked at the injured Private Rourke, leaning against a slab of broken concrete with a pistol hanging from his hand. Church was about to congratulate him when he heard a shot ring out behind him and spun round to see one of the soldiers he had thought dead falling forward to reveal Anna holding a smoking pistol in one hand. She smiled at him, "Couldn't let the hero of the hour go down before we had a chance to congratulate him."  
She nodded off to where Church could see the remaining enemy soldiers running for their lives. "They'll be back. And most of us have too many injuries to move on. We should find a defensible position and fort up."

Church thought for a moment then shook his head, "No we aren't fit to hold off another attack." Anna raised an eyebrow quizzically, "Then what do you suggest we do." Church smiled grimly "_You_ will go fort up,' He leaned down and picked up a battle rifle, 'Me. I'm goin to do some hunting..."

It was well past dusk by the time Church returned to where his squad was camped, radioing ahead to alert the sentry. He strode through the perimeter and dumped the bundle of scavenged supplies, weapons and ammunitions within the ring of fire-light. He looked around the faces, noted the absences, then turned to Anna. "We should be safe for a few days now. So what are we looking at Corporal.

If she was surprised at the field promotion she didn't show it. "Eddie was killed in the first assault. Rocky managed to hold them off for a while, but he took a shot to the stomach and bled out. Frank Stevens was shot through the head, and they almost got his brother Paul as well but Rourke was prepared. I took a shot to my right arm,' she looked at him, 'And you don't look so good yourself sir." She leaned in to take a closer look and gasped. "What happened to your arm?"

Church glanced in surprise at his left arm. The armour was cracked and oil leaked from the holes. Church groaned in exasperation. "Must have taken a shotgun blast there at some point." He was about to pull away the piece when Rourke said, "Sir. I may not be a doctor but I'm pretty sure that people don't usually leak black oil when they are wounded."

Church stared at him for a moment then sighed, "Anna could you get Paul in here for a moment. I think there are some things about my past you all need to know..."

The characters Church, Caboose, Tucker, Simmons, Sarge, Grif, Sister, Donut and Doc are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions.


	5. Revelations

**Church's Crusade #5: Revelations**

Church told them everything. Well, almost everything. There were certain incidents that he would _never_ tell them about, such as the one with Tucker, the switch and the Reds coming over in the middle of it. In fact he would never tell _anyone_ about that. Afterwards everyone was silent for a moment. Then Anna spoke…

"So, you're a ghost of someone who was blown up by one of your team mates who was in a tank 800 years ago?"  
"Yes."  
"And you are now possessing a robot so that you can have a body of your own again?"  
"That's right."  
"And somehow you ended up travelling back in time and causing your own death?"  
"Hey don't get started on that."  
"Sorry. And then as you tried to stop the bomb that sent you back in time in the first place you created hundreds of copies of yourself? And then finally travelled forwards in time with the rest of your friends?"  
"When you put it like that it does sound kind of unbelievable," Church admitted.  
"Oh no. No we hear about this stuff all the time, 'said Rourke, 'In fact back home I ran a small clinic for possessed, time travelling robots suffering from post-mortem depression."  
"Oh fine,' grumbled Church, 'call me crazy. All I did was save your lives from overwhelming odds. I'm sure that people do that for you every day." He paused as he considered the stupidity of this comment in his current company. Paul leaned forward.  
"Well, you may be crazy, but in my opinion it's the _good_ kind of crazy. You could of left us to die, but instead you risked your li – risked your body, to help us. I may have lost my brother but at least I'm still alive."  
Anna nodded in agreement. "I think we can all agree that were much better of with you than we would have been without you."  
Both Paul and Anna looked politely at Rourke. He laughed. "Well with such overwhelming support, I'd be foolish to go against it. Looks like were stuck with you sergeant."  
Church looked at them all for a moment then grinned, "Well if that's the case then could someone help me off with this armour..."

They stayed there for a few days, the others healing and Church doing repairs on his various damaged systems. On the second day Paul approached him while he was repairing some damage to his leg.  
"Sir. I was thinking, seeing as there are so few of us and were all in a pretty bad way that maybe we should start looking at ways to improve our chances of survival."  
"And?" said Church as he reattached the fixed limb to his body.  
"Well, I had a look at our supplies and then I started thinking about some of the things my dad showed me when I was a kid, and I came up with this." He showed Church a collection of ropes, some of them tied around weights. One of the weights was a grenade. Church took it in his hands and examined it. He looked at Paul again. "This is all very nice, but what does it do?"  
Paul grinned and pulled out another one made without the grenade. He took one of the ropes in his hand and began to spin the thing above his head. The stones whirled about freely until he led the rope go, at which point the entire mass of rope spun off and rapped itself about a pole he had set in the ground a short distance away. Paul turned to Church.  
"When thrown at a person the ropes can rap around arms, legs and weapons. And the grenade just adds a slightly deadlier element to it. I also had a look at some of the other weapons, and I think that with a few modifications we could greatly improve our chances. For example, what would you say to an automatic pistol?"  
"Point that thing somewhere else?"  
"Good one sir. But seriously, that's just the start of what we could do."  
Church stared at the young private in complete astonishment. Then he looked around and shouted to the other squad members, "People guess what? Where back in business thanks to Private Stevens here..."

The characters Church, Caboose, Tucker, Simmons, Sarge, Grif, Sister, Donut and Doc are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions.


	6. An ethereal approach

**Church's Crusade #6: An…ethereal approach**

Private Wilkes did not like sentry duty. He often offered reasons the officers as to why he should be excused from the position, however they always told him to stop complaining and get to his post. This never improved his mood about the whole affair. The way he figured, if he was the one who was watching for intruders, then he would be the first to be killed in an attack. His feeling of unease was not improved by the fact that earlier that day, they had found a lone survivor of one of their skirmisher platoons. He was filthy, had lost his gun and one of his boots and one of his arms had a handprint crushed into it with a force similar to that of a hydraulic ram. That was not the most disturbing thing though. The most disturbing thing was what the soldier had apparently seen. The sergeant of the small force that they had found had been shot by the skirmisher's Captain at close range. It hadn't even slowed him as he had taken an SMG to his attacker. Now there were all sorts of rumours about the opposition using super soldiers, men who could not be killed. It was just plain scary he thought. Especially when he considered that he was now twice as likely to die while on watch. He was still thinking on this when a knife spun out of the darkness and struck him in the throat. The fact that this most recent incident would prove him right to the officers did not console him much as his life bled away...

Anna pulled her knife from the sentry's throat and wiped it on his uniform, then looked up at Church. "This could be tougher than we thought." she said, and indicated the camp spread out in front of them. Church looked and had to agree. The camp was several hundred strong and was spread across the only route to their own lines. The base had many sentry points scattered through out and had armed patrols moving through them. Plus the fires of the various groups of tents were close enough together to make the shadows too few to slip through. Anna was right. It would be _very_ tough.

Church sighed. It looked like he would have to do it. He didn't like the idea but it looked like they had no choice. He looked at what was left of his squad, "Could you guys look after my body for a little while?', he said, 'There are some things I'll have to do."  
"What?' said Rourke, 'What can you do without your body?"  
"Possess people. I don't like to do it much, but I guess I have no choice."  
"Why don't you like to do it?' said Anna, 'I would have thought it would be good fun."  
Church grimaced, "There was an incident back in Blood Gulch. I got stuck in Caboose's mind for a while."  
"What was it like?" said Anna.  
"Surprisingly roomy."  
"Which one is Caboose again?' said Rourke, 'Is he the sleaze who got involved with the alien?"  
"No that was Tucker', said Anna, 'Caboose is the dim one."  
"Look is this conversation really going anywhere?' asked Paul, 'Because we still have a base to cross before morning."  
"Right.', said Church, 'I'm going to go in there and cause as much havoc as possible. Anna, when you think that it is safe. Make a break for the other side of the base. Take my body with you, but if necessary drop it." He grinned, "I can borrow another."  
Then his body fell forward into the dirt.

Church sped invisibly across the enemy base and found his target. He dropped down and possessed one of the guards outside an equipment tent. Moving quickly he raised his rifle and brought the butt down on the back of the other guard's head. He then turned and threw a grenade into the explosives and ammunitions in the tent. Then he sped off before the first explosion had started. He did this at four other tents, but at the fifth brought out a machine gun first and began to fire as the tent detonated behind him, causing more confusion. As the body he was possessing was gunned down he possessed another, then another, all the while moving further away from his squad.

When he reached the edge of the base he left his current body and jumped back to the centre of the base. He located his running team and jumped back into his body. As he regained a feel for the mechanical limbs he heard a cry and saw Paul go down as his still healing leg collapsed underneath him. Without even breaking stride he scooped the private up and draped him across his shoulders then continued. They were about one hundred metres from the darkness on the other side of the base when someone yelled. "STOP! Intruders!" Then it suddenly seemed the entire base was running in there direction.

Church looked at Rourke. "Take Paul! Whatever happens, just keep running. I'll catch up if I can."  
Rourke looked as though he was about to object, then thought better of it. He took Paul over his shoulders and dropped Church's pack, which he had been carrying while the sergeant had been absent. Then he ran off into the darkness.

Church turned back to the oncoming forces, leaned down and heaved up a large slap of concrete. Then he ducked behind it, laid out his weapons and rose up with Paul's rope device whirling above his head and sent it into the enemy forces. The ropes wrapped about the legs of a soldier and dropped him to be trampled under the feet of his allies, before the grenade detonated and scattered the forces. Then Church drew his pistols, each one modified to support automatic fire at the flick of a lever. He smiled, and spoke, so softly that no one else heard.

"Let's play..."

The characters Church, Caboose, Tucker, Simmons, Sarge, Grif, Sister, Donut and Doc are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions.


	7. Fighting for time

**Church's Crusade #7: Fighting for time**

Church opened fire with both weapons at once. The enemy, surprised by the rapid spray of bullets fell back to regroup. The next attack came from a group of apparently occupied soldiers in the form of a frag grenade. Church saw it out of the corner of his eye and turned to face it. As it came in close he caught it lightly in one hand and spun, hurling it back into the waiting enemy. As he watched the small object detonate, he felt the edge of a knife bite into the neck of his armour, and turned to find a young soldier backing away. Before he could get any further however, Church tore the knife from his neck and drove it down through the top of the recruit's skull. He then grabbed the body around the neck and brought it up to block the hail of gunfire that rained in, ducking behind the slab and returning fire when he could. As the firing petered off, Church dropped his now empty pistols and brought the two SMGs to bear, firing until these two were depleted, and finishing the one soldier to make it to his position with a blow that almost spun the man's head. Then, dropping the SMGs, he leaned down and picked up the fallen soldier's rifle. Holding it in one hand he looked calmly around at the waiting soldiers, stunned into immobility. Behind his visor, he smiled. To the enemy, he beckoned...

Anna, Rourke and Paul made it into their base camp near to 0200 hours. They were exhausted and almost collapsed the moment they entered the encampment. However they were hauled to their feet almost immediately, Rourke still supporting Paul, whose leg wound had reopened during the run, and were taken to the leader of their battle group, Commander Rieke. As soon as they entered the tent, Rieke took one look at Paul and had him sent to the med-tent. Then he turned to Anna and Rourke, "Would someone mind telling me what is going on here? I'm getting reports of explosions from the enemy positions, and then I see you two and Private Stevens stumble into camp, after being MIA for two weeks. Where are your superiors and what has happened to the rest of your squad?"  
There was a moment of silence then Anna spoke, "Private 1st Class Annabelle Sharpe, sir. I have taken on the duties of Corporal Stone at the request of Sergeant Church. On the return from our scout mission we encountered a skirmisher platoon, numbering approximately 30 personnel. They located us and we were forced into a fighting retreat. We eventually took refuge in a ruined apartment block..."

Church fought at close quarters now, using whatever weapons he had to hand. A sawn-off shotgun was his primary weapon and he used it to great effect. However he was being forced back slowly, but surely. As he spun to attack another he felt a close range blast to his left arm and felt it swing loose, all but severed. Church stared at the loose hanging limb then turned on his opponent in rage...

"... we ran through the base. Stevens fell but Sarge managed to get him to Rourke. Then he stayed behind to cover our retreat."  
Rieke nodded, "He is dead then."  
Anna smiled, "I sincerely doubt that sir..."

Church held his severed limb in his right and laid about him with it, crushing in skulls and breaking necks. He would not fall, but he could not fight on. He turned and ran.

The characters Church, Caboose, Tucker, Simmons, Sarge, Grif, Sister, Donut and Doc are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions.


	8. The Titan's Fall

**Church's Crusade #8: The Titan's Fall**

He ran through the smoke and dust, climbing over piles of rubble and sprinting across ruined streets, until at last he found somewhere to hide. It would not be safe for long, but it would be long enough.  
Church laid out what was left of his tools and set to work on repairing his arm. It would not be a perfect job, but it would serve till he got back to base. An hour, later with a mostly functional arm reattached, Church left the building and continued towards home.

Back at base Anna and the rest of the squad were in an argument with Commander Rieke.  
"You can't just pull out!' said Anna desperately, "Church is still out there."  
"Yea,' said Paul, 'He risked his life to give us a chance and you just want to leave him here?"  
"ENOUGH!' yelled Rieke, 'I know you think he may still be alive, but the fact of the matter is no one could survive an attack from such a force. We do not have enough forces to hold this position any longer and that is the end of the matter. The drop ships are being loaded as we speak so I suggest you return to your quarters and prepare for departure."  
Anna bit her lip, wondering whether she should mention the truth about Church to the commander. At last she made a decision.  
"Sir." she said stiffly, then turned on her heel and marched out of the commander's tent, the others trailing behind.

Church slipped up behind the soldier as quietly as possible. As he moved the rubble underneath him shifted slightly, dislodging a stone which rolled down the pile he was on. The soldier heard and turned to find Church's fist driving into his gut. Church then reached up, and placing his hands on the man's head, snapped his neck. He then carefully laid the soldier down and picked up his weapon and moved of towards the base.

As he approached the site he saw the drop ships beginning to ascend and began to run. He saw other figures running and realised that the enemy was taking this last opportunity to deal some damage to their enemy. He sighed, then took his rifle and began to fire.

Anna was sitting in the back of the last drop ship when she heard the gun shots. She looked out at the approaching forces as the drop ship began to takeoff. One of them was firing on his comrades? That couldn't be right. She looked out the back of the ship and saw. . . Church! She got up and called back, "Rourke, Stevens. Get up here. It's the sergeant."  
The rest of the squad hurried up…

Church dodged through the troops, avoiding obstacles as he sprinted to the last drop ship. He ran, jumped . . . and caught the bottom of the drop ship ramp. Suddenly hands were pulling him up into the craft. He stood and started to thank them when he heard a loud report and felt a bullet penetrate the back of his helmet. As the power flowed from his limbs he found himself thinking, "Maybe it won't be so bad . . ."

The characters Church, Caboose, Tucker, Simmons, Sarge, Grif, Sister, Donut and Doc are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions.


	9. Rebirth

**Church's Crusade #9: The Rebirth **

Darkness…

All he saw was darkness, as he floated in oblivion. Then finally thought returned, "This is really boring…"

It was this that made Church realise that he was perhaps not as dead as he'd expected. Well what else was new? He'd spent years not being quite as dead as he should be. Of course he wasn't quite alive either. On the whole he tried not to think about it. It would have been a painful subject if he could still feel pain. He had always been a bit uncertain as to whether this was a good thing or not. Granted pain was unpleasant, but with the loss of that sensation he lost one more connection to his humanity. However he became aware that he could feel something, a sense of belonging, at one time new yet still maddeningly familiar. What was it? And then it hit him. It was his body, changed yet functioning once more. He hesitated for a moment, deciding whether he really wanted to exist again. However that decision was made easy when the thought returned again, "This is really boring…"

Anna sat by the work bench, eyelids heavy, head lolling as she fought sleep. She knew that Paul would be by to relieve her in a few minutes and was looking forward to falling into her bunk in the barracks. She looked at the still, shrouded form on the bench in front of her and wondered, "Would he come back?" It was the question they had all been asking since Church collapsed in the drop ship. She thought back over the months and saw again what had happened in the moments after the shot had found its mark…

…as the power left him the sergeant had fallen forward, to be caught by the three squad members. Rourke and Stevens had fussed about, removing Church's helmet and checking against obvious evidence whether the sergeant had survived. Anna stood over them and watched, not wanting to believe it. It was not until Rourke proclaimed, "That's it. He's gone," that Anna acted. Taking two quick steps to the weapons rack, she picked up her sniper rifle and aimed it at the troops still firing upon the slowly rising drop ship. She fired again and again, each shot cutting down another man until they began to run and jump behind cover. She reloaded and kept up the barrage of fire until she had once again emptied her magazine. It was then that the sniper who had shot Church broke cover and began to run for a nearby building. Anna watched, calmly reloading, then raised her rifle and took four precise shots, each hitting the man in the head and completely shattering his skull. With that she turned and replaced here rifle on the weapons rack, then looked up. Rourke and Paul were staring at her in amazement. Finally Paul found his voice "Was that really necessary?"

"No', said Anna, 'but it made me feel better."

She walked past and sat down at the side of the seat in silence. The others didn't disturb her further…

Anna was brought back to the present by the sound of footsteps coming down the hall. She stood up, turned and was about to open the door when she heard a voice speaking quietly behind her.

"Typical. I'm away from this thing for a few months and someone starts remodelling."

Anna spun around and stared at the shrouded figure on the bench, hardly daring to believe what she had just heard. She stood perfectly still until the figure said; "Could you get this table cloth off me. What do I look like, furniture?"

Anna rushed over and pulled back the cover as Paul entered the room. Church sat up and stretched. "So what's new?"

Paul looked on in surprise for a moment then finally said, "Well for a start you should look in the mirror…"

The characters Church, Caboose, Tucker, Simmons, Sarge, Grif, Sister, Donut and Doc are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions.


	10. A new man Again

**Church's Crusade #10: A New Man. Again.**

"A mirror?" said Church in confusion, "What are you talking about?" However he got up and walked towards the sink in the corner of the room, to look into the piece of reflective silver glass over the basin. What he saw would have stopped his heart…if he still had a heart.

Gray-blue eyes stared back at him from out of an unmarked, pale skinned face, topped by untidy black hair. He looked at his hands and saw that they were the same as he remembered, down to the scar on his left palm that he had got while drinking on his sixteenth. He then looked at his feet, counting ten toes. It was all there, he thought. He shook his waist experimentally. Yes, it was _definitely_ all there.

He looked at his face again. All exactly as he remembered it. Just not as it should be.

He turned to the other two, looking first at Paul, then at Anna. The words caught in his throat, "How did you do this?"

"We used the technicians on the ship here", said Anna, "They helped repair the damage and make some improvements. Then we covered your body in synth-flesh." Church thought for a moment of the artificial pieces of tissue that could be bonded to wounds and would eventually fuse with the body, before asking the next question, "How did you know what I looked like?"

Anna looked at him for a moment, then reached into her pocket and pulled out several photographs. They showed various scenes: people at the beach, a group of friends at a party, two couples kissing in the back of a car. The one that drew Church's new eyes the most however was one that showed just two people. One he would have seen if he had looked in the mirror. He was wearing a black tuxedo and bow tie, with a white rose on the front. The other was a girl, no older than eighteen, with red hair in a black dress. They were looking at the camera and smiling. The boy looked as though he could not believe his luck to be standing with the girl, who looked as though she did not smile often, but looked all the better for it. Church reached out, taking the picture and turning it over to read the writing on the back:

"_A wonderful night Len, lets never forget it._

_-Ali"_

In much smaller writing below it was written the words:

"_P.S. Borrowed $30 from your wallet."_

Church looked up at Anna. "Where did you get these?" he asked her.

Anna took a deep breath before replying, "We found them in the side of your helmet." She waited to see how he would react before continuing, "It didn't look like they had been touched in a long time, but it was the only thing we had to work with. We know you look a little younger than- sir what's wrong?"

Church was sobbing as he continued to look at the photo in his hand. He noted dumbly that he could actually feel tears running down his cheeks. He didn't react when Anna came closer and put her arm around him. She asked again, "What's wrong?"

Church looked at her, "This is the last picture we took together. I'd forgotten I had it."

Anna turned her head and looked at Paul. He looked back and shrugged.

Church looked at the other pictures, and then sighed. He didn't like it but this brought home the fact well and truly. She was gone. He had lost her forever…

For the next few days Church sat in bed and didn't say another word. There was always one of the squad sitting by his bed, trying to get him to speak. However, after the third day they gave up and just sat in silence. The fourth day came and went. On the fifth day, a few minutes after Anna had come to relieve Rourke, she heard a voice speak, "So what does it do?" She didn't recognise it at first. Then it registered that it must be Church.

"What?" she asked.

"What does it do? My body. You said when I…woke up that the technicians had made a few improvements. What are they?"

Anna smiled to herself. He was talking. It may not be much but it was a start. She looked up and met his eyes. "Well, let's start with your skin…"

The characters Church, Caboose, Tucker, Simmons, Sarge, Grif, Sister, Donut and Doc are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions.


	11. Back to normal? Yeah right

**Church's Crusade #11: Back to Normal? Yeah right.**

"…finally, we replaced most of your arm and legs with hydraulic systems so that you can lift extremely heavy loads," finished Anna. She turned to look at Church expectantly, "Any questions?"

"How heavy is extremely heavy?" he asked.

"Oh, I don't know. We never really tested it. To be safe don't lift anything heavier than an old VW Beatle."

Church whistled softly to himself. This was just one of many changes made to his body while he had been absent. For example, he now knew that Anna and some of the programmers had put together an auto-sniping system so that he could now hit people when he used the weapon. The fact he couldn't seem to get it to work bothered him a bit but that was okay.

Also, not only could his eyes now utilise a digital zoom system to clearly see an object 200m away, but the colours of the pupil and iris were now optional. He had experimented with many different colour combinations, finally settling on a shifting opalescent sheen that covered both iris and pupil. He was a little disappointed that they had not been able to do something similar with his hair.

He looked at Anna, "Well I guess it's time to get back into it then…"

For the next few weeks Church spent his time in training, improving his skill with various weapons, trying (and failing **(Stevens said it was probably because the universe had a sense of humour)**) to get the sniper system to work and learning how to use the various new features of his body. This turned out to be a good idea, as at one point, without intending, Church shot a knife out of a compartment in his armour, driving it several inches into the wall and nearly removing Rourke's ear in the process. He learned of the various improvements to his armour including an attempt at an auto-repair system and even a prototype stealth generator. One question cropped up a lot and that was, "Why no jet boosters?"

He never got a satisfactory answer to that.

The army went on several minor missions during this time. In some of them Church even got to combat test his new body. It came as something of a shock to the enemy when he was able to remove a man's head with a single slash of his knife, and no less of a shock to him. At one point he was also able to lift up a broken slap of concrete and carry it as a shield into an enemy position, much to their distress. The rest of the team also improved greatly as time went on, sometimes racking up more kills than groups four times there number. His small but volatile squad was quickly promoted to elite status and sent on increasingly dangerous missions. Also, many of Stevens' weaponry innovations became standard equipment for the army. All things considered things were going very well. So naturally, something went wrong…

Church strode into the squad room, flickering his eyes through various colours as he looked at the orders envelope in his hand. The others nodded to him as he entered, sat on his bunk and opened the envelope. He pulled out the mission overview and glanced at it. It seemed fairly standard: enemy forces taken up positions at this location, his squad along with several other groups were to remove them. There were some opposing forces already there, not associated with either group and certainly not with each other. They were to be eliminated if they got in the way. Wondering idly who the soldiers already there were working for, he glanced at the mission location…and dropped the briefing, jumping back as if he had been bitten. The others in the squad saw this and came over quickly. "Sir, what's wrong?" asked Rourke. Silently, Church pointed a shaking finger at the papers on the floor. Anna reached down and picked them up, and looked through them until her eyes came to rest on four words:

_**Mission Location: BLOOD GULCH.**_

_**The characters Church, Caboose, Tucker, Simmons, Sarge, Grif, Sister, Donut and Doc are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions.**_


	12. Familiar Faces

**Church's Crusade #12: Familiar Faces**

Anna looked up at Church. "Blood Gulch? We're going to Blood Gulch?"

"Well that's great isn't it?' said Stevens, 'You get to see all your friends again."

"No it isn't', said Anna, 'It says in the briefing that if the local forces become a problem then we have to eliminate them. We may be required to kill all of them. Caboose, Tucker, Sister, Doc, Sarge, Simmons, Donut and Grif. Plus', she said quietly to Stevens and Rourke, 'There are some painful memories there for him. He may not be able to handle it."

"I can hear you, you know', said Church suddenly, making them jump, 'You hadn't forgotten that you had improved my hearing had you?"

Anna looked at him guiltily, "Sorry sir. So what are we going to do?"

Church looked at her. "What are you talking about corporal?"

"How are we going to deal with the Blood Gulch problem?"

"We deal with it the same way we always do soldier. We follow orders as far as they take us. And when the situation demands it, we improvise…"

Three days later they had begun their descent to the planet's surface. The entire squad was decked out in brown camo gear, except Church whose armour could accommodate for him. All was silent as they watched the canyon get closer and closer through the view-port…

Tucker spun and fired at the oncoming soldiers in their brown uniforms. Four went down to his gun shots and a fifth fell as Tucker drew his knife and stabbed it through his chest. He turned again in time to see the butt of a riffle coming towards his head. The blow knocked him off his feet and the soldier was about to finish him off when he was suddenly grasped about the neck. Tucker heard the bone snap and saw the body hurled to land almost eight feet away.

Tucker looked up and saw the enormous figure of Caboose standing over him, before the blue giant rushed into the battle with a cry of "EVIL KITTENS WITH SPIKES ON THEM!"

Tucker shook his head to clear it from the fog left by the blow. He had never been able to understand the logic behind Caboose's battle cries, but whatever it was it seemed to terrify the enemy. Tucker could understand that. It scared him a lot of the time as well. As he watched Caboose's attacks break the enemy force, and saw the usually good natured figure turn and return to the base tucker began to wonder, "Will we get through this?" Then with a shrug he turned and staggered back to the blue base…

"E.T.A. 10 minutes," the pilot called back from the drop-ship's cockpit, 'Prepare to disembark."

Church sat in silence as the rest of the squad grabbed their weapons and prepared for landfall. Suddenly the radio crackled to life.

"Squad Delta-22-Ringo-Charlie, do you read, over?"

Church switched on his mike, "Roger that command, this is Delta-22-Ringo-Charlie. Sergeant Church reporting. What are your orders? Over."

"Sergeant, you are to change your trajectory and land near the Blue base. The local forces there need to be eliminated. They are putting up some resistance. Over."

Roger that command. Over and out."

Church flicked off his mike and looked up to see the rest of his squad looking at him. "What is it?" he asked.

"We heard the orders", said Rourke, "Are we really going to get rid of everyone at Blue base?"

Church shrugged, "We have our orders. We know what we've been told to do. We know what we _have_ to do. And now", he said as he strapped his shotgun on his back, his pistols to his belt and picked up his rifle, "now we improvise." And with that he walked into the cockpit, his fist into the back of the co-pilot's head and aimed his gun at the pilot. The whole thing took only a few seconds.

"You will fly on our present course until I say otherwise. When I say, you will take your friend here and a parachute for both of you, and you will jump overboard. Is that understood?"

"Y-yes sir," the pilot stammered.

Church turned and called back to the squad, "All of you. If this you do not wish to be deemed traitors in the eyes of this army then I suggest you disembark presently. If you choose to stick with me, you will be abandoning this vessel soon anyway." With that he turned and looked back out the front of the drop-ship…

Tucker and Caboose held the advancing force off as they advanced towards the entrance of the base. Sister sat on top of the fortress and was demonstrating a surprising skill with a sniper rifle. But tucker knew that they couldn't hold the enemy off forever. As he watched, yet another drop-ship came into view as it approached the canyon. He shook his head to remove this thought from his mind and fired again…

"Now, everyone out!" barked Church. As the pilot dragged his partner to the back of the ship and the rest of his team disembarked, parachutes strapped to their backs. Church looked out as he locked the controls. As the ship sped towards it's destination he looked out at the ground drawing closer, the base becoming clearer, the first of the attacking soldiers turning their heads to look at the incoming ship…

The ship struck the soldiers with a force that shook the ground. Tucker watched as the vessel ground through the dirt, and saw a figure leap from the back of it, gattling-guns attached to each arm. As soon as he landed the man began to fire into the middle of the enemy forces. And as he watched he saw fire coming from other places as well. One man could be seen spinning a collection of ropes over his head, another was rushing the enemy with a battle rifle and a third, a young woman was firing carefully with a sniper rifle. Soon the enemy forces were running and Tucker could see their saviours marching across the grass towards the blue base, a figure in battered and dirty armour at their head, gattling-guns discarded in favour of a battle rifle. Tucker stepped out to meet them.

"Thanks for the help', he said to the leader, 'Can I ask who I'm speaking to?"

The figure looked at him for a moment, then reached up and removed his helmet. Tucker gasped.

"_**YOU!..."**_

The characters Church, Caboose, Tucker, Simmons, Sarge, Grif, Sister, Donut and Doc are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions.


	13. Unhappy Reunion

**Church's Crusade #13: Unhappy Reunion**

"Look Tucker, I know you might not be too happy to see me', said Church, 'But this-"

"Your damn right I don't want to see you. The last time you were here you punched me in the face and threatened to shoot me. Do you think I want to hear anything you have to say…"

"Hey, listen man, if we don't work to-"

"…you think you can just waltz back in here with your new fucking commando moves and everything will be okay again…"

"Fuck I don't have time for this." Church turned and looked at his small squad, "Hey Anna can you come stand in front of Tucker for a moment?" He then turned to Tucker again and waited to see his reaction.

"…we're doing perfectly fine until you showed up and – Hello and who might you be?"

Church couldn't help but smile to himself at this display that was so typically _Tucker._ March a pretty girl in front of him and an atom bomb wouldn't distract him from her. In fact this was probably true of _any _girl. The only downside Church could see in this situation is that he would have to endure Tucker's trademark phrase, _Bow-Chicka-Bow-Wow._ Still things could be worse, Church reminded himself. Gary could be here to give his unique perspective on things, with Andy for commentary. Church returned his attention to Tucker, just in time to catch, "…-icka-Bow-Wow." Deciding that it would be a while before he could talk to anyone intelligent, he turned his attention to Caboose.

"Hey Caboose, what's been happening here since I left?"

"Well, when you left I made a muffin and then Sister and I played Eye Spy, and then-"

"Yea, yea, that's great. What's happened _recently?"_

"Oh well a bunch of guys came down in big ships and told us we could either help them or they could kill us and make us dead. Tucker asked what they would be doing and they said killing everyone else in the canyon. Sister didn't like it because her brother is at Red base. Then Tucker said we wouldn't go down without a fight, which is good because I want to be alive. Then I sort of blacked out. The last thing I remember was some evil looking spikey kittens and then I woke up with a sore throat and you were talking to me."

"Uh-huh." Church turned back to look at Tucker who seemed for the first time to have given up because the girl he was focussing on was giving him her _complete _attention. And not in a good way. Tucker looked at last at Church, "So why are you here? More importantly how are you here looking like _that_? You died and then you left. Remember?"

Church smiled coldly, "Oh yes I remember. Lets just say that those behind me decided to give me an upgrade. Now to business. Caboose has told me roughly what has happened over the past few days. Why haven't you been using the tank?"

"Tank?" Tucker looked surprised, "Oh that got blown up in the first attack. We've been surviving with just our guns for days now."

"Okay then what about the Reds?"

"They were forced out of their base and are hiding in the caves. Sarge even agreed to work with us to a degree. He said that at least we Blues have the honour to try and stab you in the back. These new guys will try and kill you with a bombing raid."

Church thought for a moment then looked up, "Right well if you guys will help us salvage what we can from the ship we can reinforce our position. Hey Sister how you doing?" he called to the yellow armoured figure coming down the base's entry ramp.

Sister looked from Church to Caboose then asked, "Hey whose that?"

"That is Church. That's what he looks like with skin."

"Oh yea? He's kinda' hot."

Church looked back at Tucker, "So are we agreed? Will we work together?"

Tucker looked at him for a moment then grinned, "Sure why not…"

They spent the next hour unloading the ship and gathering whatever parts might be of use, most of them carrying a case between two, Caboose carrying one under his arms and Church carrying one on each shoulder. Soon they had a massive pile in the centre of the base. Church clapped his hands together.

"Now to get to work on the tank."

"What?' said Tucker, 'Since when do you know how to fix anything?"

"Since they took out my memory unit and loaded all this new and interesting shit onto it. Now do you want to help or not?"

Church marched to where the overturned tank lay and braced himself before slowly heaving it up until it flipped. Then he took a the tool kit and began to work…

Several hours later Church was just putting the finishing touches on the tank when he felt a knife being pressed to his neck. He carefully laid down his spanner and stood up. The knife was removed and a gun was pressed into the small of his back. Church listened carefully to the sound of breathing and on the edge of hearing, heartbeats.

"Now don't you try anything funny sergeant. There's six of us and only one of you. Were taking you back under charge of treason and your going to-"

"Your wrong,' said Church.

"What?' the man asked in confusion, 'What you talking 'bout?"

"There are not six of you. There are only three. The man moving round on my left is holding an SMG, which judging by the rattling of the weapon, only has 15-20 rounds left. The other gentleman on my right is holding a battle rifle, and is smoking a cigarette. And you my friend have a magnum which I would guess has a tendency to jam, especially with your hand shaking like that. Now we have three choices.

1) You can let me go and back away very carefully and I will give you a head start, 2) You can surrender now and I will take you to the base nearby, or 3) You can continue to be idiots and I can kill you. Take your pick boys, it makes no difference to me. But I would prefer not to get my armour any dirtier than it already is."

"Shut up!', shouted one of the men behind him, 'Start walking, your coming with us."

"Oh dear,' said Church, "And we were getting on so well."

His arm snaked down and the knife shot from his armour into the gut of the man behind him just as Church's other hand grasped the pistol. He then spun and fired the gun into the head of the man holding the SMG, and turned to look at the man with the battle rifle and found him running for his life. Church sighed, leaned down to retrieve his knife then threw it after the retreating figure. The knife struck the soldier in the back of his knee and he collapsed. As Church wandered over to him and as the man tried to bring his rifle to bear, promptly shot him in the back of his hand. He then carefully bandaged the man's wounds then lifted him onto his shoulder.

"Your coming back with me he,' he said, 'We need to have a little chat…"

The characters Church, Caboose, Tucker, Simmons, Sarge, Grif, Sister, Donut and Doc are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions.


	14. I before E, except after SMG

**Church's Crusade #14: I before E, except after SMG**

Tucker looked up as he heard the tank grinding up. The scene that met his eyes totally threw him. The tank was working and it was returning. What surprised him was the injured soldier, trussed at the hands and feet, hanging from the tank's cannon with a gag in his mouth. Tucker wandered over as the tank stopped and Church got out. He indicated the man suspended beside them.

"Sooo what's that about?"  
Church pulled off his helmet then looked up, "Oh him? He and a couple of his friends tried to capture me while I was fixing the tank. Their dead now. Didn't take my warning." He reached up and casually cut the ropes holding the man up. He fell and landed with a thump on the top of the tank, gasping, before Church hauled him to his feet. Tucker looked at Church.

"So again, why did you bring him here?"

Church shrugged, "I figured he could give us some information. You know we could find out about what they are planning."

"Well, you picked a good time to do it,' said a new voice, 'Sarge just sent me over from the caves."

Church looked over at the approaching figure of Grif, "So when did you get back? Last I heard, you went psycho and tried to murder Tucker here."

"It wasn't that bad."

"Oh you must think I'm complaining. I'm not. If he dies then no one will make a move on my sister. If you like I'll lend you my pistol."

"Thanks, but we might need him later. So what does Sarge have to say?"

"Oh you know, he thinks you blues are horribly inferior, but he is working on a plan which will guarantee us victory and will no doubt result in my 'unfortunate' death. You know, the usual."

"Oh yeah, I think I got you. So have you met my squad?"

"What, you mean Tucker, Sister and Caboose? Yeah I've met them man. I am related to-"

"No I didn't mean blue team. I meant my squad." Church looked over to the base where Anna was sitting on guard duty, "Hey, Anna! Get the others and come over here. I got someone I want you to meet."

"Yes sir." Anna turned and walked back into the base.

Grif looked confused, "Sir? Have I missed something?"

"Oh yeah, I'm their sergeant. A lot has changed."

"You're a sergeant?' said Grif, 'There are two Sarge's?"

"That's right,' said Anna as her and the rest of the squad walked over, 'I'm his corporal Annabelle Sharpe and these are Privates Stevens and Rourke. And judging by the colour of your armour, you would be Grif. Am I right?"

"Yeah that's right,' Grif turned to Church, 'Man what else has changed since I was last here. Has Tucker gone celibate and Caboose become a brain surgeon."

"Hey I am just as ready as ever and Caboose is just as stupid. They're facts of life."

"I don't think Caboose is stupid,' said Anna, 'He's actually kind of sweet."

Tucker stared at her for a moment then threw his hands up in the air, "I don't believe this! What is going on here? I mean why is it always Caboose of all people? Why not me? Why not ME?"

"Can we get back to the business at hand please?' said Church turning back to Grif, 'So how are you guys doing, you know, equipment wise?"

"Well we managed to get the Puma and Sarge's Mongoose into the caves, as well as most of our ammunition. As far as I know you guys still have the hover bike. We still have about 20 rockets and other explosives. However these guys are well equipped and have far more men than we do. We probably don't stand a chance."

"Yes, well we have been working to strengthen our defences here. Let me show you what we have been building on top of the base."

Church turned around and started towards the base. This was fortunate because at this point, someone tried to shoot him in the head…

The characters Church, Caboose, Tucker, Simmons, Sarge, Grif, Sister, Donut and Doc are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions.


	15. Sez you

**Church's Crusade #15: Sez You**

Church stood and fired from behind the quickly erected barricade at the troops rushing towards the base, then ducked behind steel wall as a hail of bullets rattled down on the place he had just been. As he prepared to stand again he heard the tell tale sounds of snipers, as Sister and Anna gave support from the top of the base. He smiled at that as he turned and stood again, but the smile vanished quickly as he saw the troops beginning to swarm over the tank.

He leapt the barrier and rushed at them screaming, "You FUCKERS! That's my tank!"

He fired as he ran ad saw some of the troops turn just as one of Paul's rope inventions flew into the group. The detonation threw solders in all directions. Church ran into the aftermath of the explosion, firing madly. He felt a shot to his left arm and swung about to bash his attacker with the butt of his rifle. He then continued to march towards the tank, shooting anyone who approached the cockpit. One of the soldiers managed to hurl a phosphorus grenade before a sniper shot from the base hurled him off his feet. The grenade landed on Church's visor and stuck there. Church tore at his helmet trying to remove before the explosive could detonate. After what seemed like an age, he finally managed to remove the helmet and hurled it at a group of enemy soldiers. The deadly missile burst into flame just as it passed over the soldiers' heads, setting their uniforms alight and causing them to run in terror. With a grim smile of satisfaction, Church turned back to the task at hand…

Back at the base Anna, Rourke and Stevens watched the looks of open mouthed astonishment on the faces of Grif and the Blues with no small measure of satisfaction. Finally Tucker looked up at Anna, "Your sure that's the same Church?" he asked.

Anna shrugged, "That depends what you mean."

"I'm sorry?"

"Well if you mean in the physical sense then yes, it is the pretty much the same Church. We basically used the old body and just did some…renovations."

"And in the other sense?"

"Well, emotionally, I'd say that he the Church you see before you is to the old Church what a rotweiler is to a mouse." She paused long enough to shoot one trooper who had almost made it into the driver's seat of the tank, "And a very cynical mouse at that."

Tucker looked at her for a moment before replying, "Sez you…"

As Church drew near to the tank he began to use his rifle more like a club than the range weapon it was intended to be. He spun through the battle, laying about him with the rifle and firing whenever possible.

At one point a trooper ran at him with a knife. It was only man's yell of rage that alerted him to his danger. He spun on his heel grabbing the man's jacket, snatching his knife and hurling him into another group of enemies before he knew what was happening. As he watched the man try to rise, Church felt something break through the back of his metal skull and spun about to find a stunned soldier looking at his hand which had until recently held a knife. Church did not hesitate, driving the other soldier's knife into the man's chest. He then turned and finally climbed into the driver's seat of the tank. He settled in and then began to aim the tank's cannon…

The group at the base watched as Church drove the tank into the opposing forces, methodically eliminating every enemy within range. Then they watched as he pulled the tank up to the base and stepped up. He nudged the prone form of the former prisoner, who appeared to have taken a shot to his left temple early in the fight. "So much for that idea," he muttered then looked at Anna.

"You. You have some explaining to do."

Anna looked surprised, "Me?"

"Yes you,' Church reached to the back of his head and removed the knife that was still lodged there, 'Someone left that with me. So I want to know what you did with my memory core, because it is obviously not in my head."

"Oh _that_,' said Anna dismissively, 'We just figured that, you know, the head is such an _obvious_ target for a sniper. So we moved it to your chest and then gave you an extra triple thickness of armour plating on your torso. Incidentally, you'll sink if you try to swim now."

Church stared at her, "And you didn't think it was important enough to tell _me_?"

"It didn't seem important at the time."

There was a long silence. Then finally Church shrugged and turned to Grif, "So as I was saying you really should have a look at what we are building on top of the base…

The characters Church, Caboose, Tucker, Simmons, Sarge, Grif, Sister, Donut and Doc are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions.


	16. The Fiftieth

**Church's Crusade #16: The Fiftieth**

Grif stared for several long minutes. Finally he turned to Church, "I give up. What is it?"

Church smiled for a moment as he carefully repaired the hole in the back of his head, "Well, imagine for a moment what it would look like if that piece there looked more like that piece there. Then imagine that they were attached on either side of this piece here and that these other two pieces were attached onto the bottom of that piece."

Grif stared at it again for a moment, then turned to Church, "So what is it?"

Church sighed. "It's a new type of hover-bike okay? Paul replicated some of those anti-grav things from the other bike as best he could. We are now attaching some engines that are made from old parts of the ship I crashed and we also intend to have these two gattling-guns attached to the bottom of it. After that we'll try and come up with ways to improve it."

"Sorry, but you said that Paul came up with this. How does he know about this kind of thing?"

"Oh before he joined the army he was a military physicist and engineer back on earth. He had to leave after a minor incident with an experimental weapon. They say that Southern Florida has never looked the same."

"And you're letting him design weapons for you here? On top of where you sleep?"

Church looked at Grif, "First of all. I don't sleep anymore remember? And second. That last one only happened because he forgot to carry the 3 in one of his calculations. He's promised not to do that this time."

"Huh. Well I better just get back to the other's in the caves. Just one moment." Grif raised his rifle and fired a few quick bursts at Tucker, who had been edging closer to Sister, "Stay away from my sister you sleaze!" Grif turned back to Church, "Well see ya…"

Church was spray painting an old Wyoming helmet Cobalt when Paul wandered over, "Hey Church, the new bike is done. Plus I made this to go with it."

Church looked at what the Private held in his hand. It looked, as far as Church could tell, like an old fashioned metal cavalry sabre, made from a jagged strip of the drop-ship's armour plating, with several added buttons below the hilt. He looked at Paul, "A sword?"

"Not just any sword sir. Here, hold it." Church did so.

"Now push the red button."

Church did this and the sword began to give off a low hum.

"Now push the blue button."

Church pushed the blue button and raised his eyebrows in surprise as the single edge of the weapon was suddenly covered in a cobalt-blue glow. He looked questioningly at Paul.

Paul grinned, "Superheated plasma sir, contained in a magnetic field."

"Where did you get the plasma from?"

"It's this military food,' said Paul, 'They'll put anything in it."

"Gross. So what's the green button for?"

"Oh I'll let you figure that out on your own. All you have to do is point the blade at someone and press the button. However if your going to use that you'll need to use this."

Paul walked to one of his work benches and pulled the cover from it. Underneath was a gleaming set of newly painted cobalt armour. Church stared from it to Paul.

"What's this?"

"I modified some of that stack of Wyoming's armour down in the bottom of the base. I left most of the Freelancer tech in place. I added some things to support the sabre and all it's functions, as well as modifying it's systems to mesh with your own systems. Just for a bit of fun, I did some work on the visor and people who look at it from outside will now see a skull. Also, you once told me that there were 49 Freelancer's, named after the 49 remaining states. So,' he turned over the torso section so that it was back up, 'I thought this would be appropriate."

Church looked down at the number 50 painted in black edged with white. He looked again at Paul, "50? The Fiftieth State? But it was destroyed. Nothing was left."

"Exactly,' said Paul, 'A Ghost of a State for a Ghost of a Soldier…"

The next few days passed quietly. There were occasional attacks by the enemy, but nothing major. Church continued to fight with his traditional weapons, deciding not to use the sabre yet. When he was not working on the hover-bike, Paul was repairing and modifying more of Wyoming's old armour for Rourke, Anna and himself. However, one day when Church was trying to get the sniper program to work, Paul came over to him, "Sir, it's done…"

The characters Church, Caboose, Tucker, Simmons, Sarge, Grif, Sister, Donut and Doc are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions.


	17. A knight in cobalt armour

**Church's Crusade #17: A Knight in Cobalt Armour**

Church and the rest of the people at blue base stood looking at the bike. How much they have changed thought Church, looking at his squad. Paul had managed to get them all kitted out in altered freelancer armour. Rourke was wearing a full suit of green armour, Paul was wearing the original white with a few patches of black and Anna was wearing a suit of armour that matched the brown of her old uniform. All in all, coupled with the colours of blue team and the purple armour worn by Doc, Church thought it was the second oddest sight he had ever seen, shortly behind some of the things he had seen in Caboose's head. Finally he turned his attention to the hover bike.

"…I just want to know if it can talk like Sheila did,' said Caboose, 'Then I can be friends with the big bike lady! Or man!"

"No Caboose, it doesn't talk,' said Paul, 'I didn't really have time to make an AI and frankly I don't see the point. Church can handle this thing okay on his own."

Church looked at all the faces, "Well then I guess I'd better test it out…"

Sergeant Walters was leading an eight man squad on patrol, when he heard a low humming approaching. He looked out over the rolling plains that filled the canyon and caught sight of something approaching. He lifted his binoculars and scanned the area until he located it again. What he saw completely confused him. It looked like someone was riding towards them on a large motorbike without wheels and with a couple of miniature jet engines tacked on the sides. One thing was certain. It was heading straight for him and his men. He lowered the binoculars and gestured for the men travelling beside his jeep on dirt-bikes to ready weapons, before taking up the gunner position on the back of the car. He watched as one of his men rode forward to meet the oncoming vehicle…

Church watched the man approaching him, gun held at the ready. He looked down at the controls to the hover bike. Well he was here to test it. He flicked a switch and felt the gattling-guns whir into life…

Walters watched in horror as the vehicles guns fired, picking the man off his bike and destroying the fuel tank in the process. Into the explosion that followed he saw the man vanish. He was almost ready to relax when the hover-bike came out the other side. Walters began to fire and a few moments later, so did his men. The man took out a second soldier with the gattling-guns then, to the sergeants surprise, drew a jagged looking sabre from his back. Walters was just considering the stupidity of this when the edge of the blade suddenly took on a cobalt blue glow. As he began to shout a warning he saw the man raise the sabre and bring it down on a soldier on one of the bikes. The blade cut clean through him. The sergeant tried to warn his mean as the man circled in for another pass…

Church swung the bike around and brought it up beside one of the remaining bikers. There he swung himself out of his seat and brought both feet around and into the soldier's neck. The man's neck snapped and he toppled off the bike, which Church caught under the handle bars with his feet before it could lose control. Then, using the increased strength of his robotic body, he swung the bike about and sent it hurtling into the other biker trooper. He then swung about towards the jeep – and into a hail of gunfire from the passenger seat. He looked at the determined soldier with the battle rifle and held up the sabre. Green button Paul had said. Point and press. Church did so and saw a burning bolt of blasma shoot out to hit the man squarely in the eyes. After a seconds surprise he began to ride headlong at the oncoming vehicle…

Walters kept firing, trying to kill the driver of the bike, but nothing seemed to work. All too soon he saw the sabre slash through the hood of the jeep before removing the driver's head. As the blade burned through him, Walters looked into the helmet, at the grinning skull shown therein, before the darkness of death swept over him…

About two hours after he had left, Church pulled back into blue base, battered and with the occasional bullet holes, but basically unharmed. He stepped off the bike and walked over to the others. He took a deep, though totally unnecessary breath before speaking, "Well, I think we can safely say that it works…"

The characters Church, Caboose, Tucker, Simmons, Sarge, Grif, Sister, Donut and Doc are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions.


	18. Babysitting

**Church's Crusade #18: Babysitting**

Things returned to normal for several days after the events with the hover-bike. That is, as normal as they ever got in Blood Gulch. There were no more major attacks against Blue Base, although there were several assassination attempts against Church. He still had one of the sniper rounds in his head, rattling around like the ball in a can of spray paint. However it was not until several days after the hover-bike was finished and Church was on patrol when his radio crackled to life…

"…Hello, hello. Church? Are you there Church? Please pickup. Um…the end."

Church smiled wryly before flicking on his mike, "Yes Caboose, I'm here. What's up?"

"Oh hi Church! Um you know the guy in the armour that looks kind of like Sister's but is more…um…red?"

"You mean Grif?"

"Yes that is it! Grif! Well he has come out of the caves and has said that the guy in the red armour…"

"Sarge,' Church prompted.

"…wants to meet with you to discus the re-talli-tory operation. Ooh are we going to play Operation? I am good at that. I can make it buzz every time."

"No we are not going to play Operation Caboose. And where the hell is Tucker?"

"Oh well when Grif came over he found Tucker and Sister in one of the corners of the base. I don't know what they were doing, but Grif got very mad and chased Tucker up a tree and is now trying to shoot him down,' Caboose was silent for a moment before continuing in a whisper, 'Grif looks kind of mad."

Oh no. As much as he hated to admit it, they might need Tucker in the not too distant future. He spoke quickly into the mike, "I'll be there soon Caboose." He then switched it off before sprinting back to Blue base…

When he arrived he found Tucker still high in the tree and Grif still shooting at him. How Tucker had managed to get up to where he clung to the branches was beyond Church, as there were no branches for the first eight feet of trunk. Church walked over to Grif.

"Okay man, what's this all about?"

"I found him alone with my sister. Hell knows what they were doing."

"I see,' said Church, 'Look mate would you please stop shooting for a moment?"

"NO."

Church sighed, then reached out to grasp the barrel of Grif's riffle in one hand. He held it for a moment then tightened his grip, crushing the barrel flat. Grif glared at him a moment before drawing his knife and rushing to the tree to begin to scramble upwards. Church sighed again, then walked over to the tree and began to shake the trunk. He put most of his massive strength into it and shortly the two soldiers fell down to lie gasping in the dirt. Church reached down and grabbed Grif's knife before the orange armoured figure could bring himself to his feet. This didn't slow Grif down. As soon as he realised that he had been disarmed, he launched himself at Tucker and tried to strangle the blue team member. Tucker fought back just as fiercely.

Church watched this for a few minutes before reaching down and hooking a hand into the armour of each brawler and wrenching them apart. Even holding them at arms length did not seem to work, as both Grif and Tucker continued to try to hit each other. Frustrated, Church banged them together a few times then went to Caboose.

"Can you hold this for a moment?' he asked before passing him Grif. Caboose obliged and Church walked over to the hover-bike and picked up a coil of rope, carrying Tucker all the way. He then walked to one of the nearby trees and tied Tuckers hand s behind his back, before tying the other end of the coil to the tree and cutting off the excess rope. He then walked back to Caboose to collect him and tied him in the same way to another tree. The length of the ropes meant that the two men could just reach each other – if they didn't mind having their arms wrenched from their sockets.

Church looked at each of them sternly, "There we go. Now you can stay like that until you can behave like proper substandard soldiers." He paused for a moment before removing both soldier's helmets and turning on the helmet cameras. He then positioned each helmet so that it had a clear view of it's owner, then walked away…

In the morning when he went to check on them, Church was surprised at what he found. Tucker, being who he was, appeared to be fast asleep. Grif on the other hand was very much awake, his face covered in scratches. Church stared at him for a long moment.

"What happened to you?' asked Church, trying to keep the laughter out of his voice.

"What happened?! I got attacked by some sort of alien hedgehog that's what! Gods, it tried to eat my face!"

"I know,' said Tucker from behind Church, 'It was hilarious."

"Enough of this,' said Church, 'You can both stop trying to kill each other. Now please."

Reluctantly, both Grif and Tucker nodded.

"Now, Grif will you take me to see Sarge?"

Grif looked at Church for a long moment then nodded helplessly…

The characters Church, Caboose, Tucker, Simmons, Sarge, Grif, Sister, Donut and Doc are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions.


	19. A plan forms

**Church's Crusade #19: A Plan Forms**

Grif led Church through a network of tunnels to the reds temporary base. At one point he stopped and turned to Church.  
"Alright, I know you took the disk from my helmet. Are you going to give it back?"  
"No, I think I'll hang onto it," said Church.  
"Give it back right now!"  
"And what are you going to do about it if I don't?" said Church, tilting his head just enough to cast his eyes into shadow and changing his eye colour so that red light seemed to shine out of the darkness. Grif backed away.  
"Oh, um nothing I guess,' said Grif, turning his head so he did not have to look at Church.  
"Wise decision." Church raised his head so that his face was fully illuminated again and shifted his eyes back to their normal blue-grey.  
"Uh…yeah. Right." Grif turned and led Church down a few more bends until they came at last to the big central cavern. Church looked about and saw Sarge approaching, shotgun in had as ever.  
"Hello Sergeant Church. Now I know we were meant to talk about strategy and stuff, but there is something more important to discuss." Sarge looked very serious for a moment, then grinned. "I hear you have a disk showing Grif being tormented by a hedgehog. Let's see it!"  
"Right here Sarge,' said Church, pulling the disk from a slot in his armour. In the background he could hear Grif talking with Donut.  
"…telling you man, the guy is fucking demonic. Just before when we were coming through the caves, he looked at me, and it was like his eyes were glowing fucking red!"  
"Maybe he's been working too many late nights. That will make anyone's eyes red."  
"You know what man, I cannot fucking talk to you. You just don't understand…"  
Church's attention snapped back to the figure in front of him, as Sarge reached out and took the disc of Church and put into a nearby computer that had obviously been brought from Red base when the Red's escaped. Soon an image of Grif tied to a tree and obviously miserable appeared on the screen. Sarge watched until a multi-coloured hedgehog-like creature came into the picture and leapt onto Grif's face.  
Sarge turned to Church, "This may be the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. Now onto the strategy…"

Several hours later, Church, Anna, Caboose and Grif were slipping through the darkness to the enemy occupied Red base. Sarge's strategy had been simple, and in a rare stroke for the red commander, also brilliant…

"You see these big stalagmites that have joined with the stalactites. Well we figure that if we can get the bulk of the enemy over them at the right time, then we can blow apart the bottom of the pillars and the weight of the rest of them should drag the ceiling of this cavern down with them. That way the enemy will plummet to their inevitable deaths. Hooah!"  
"Great, sounds perfect. What's the catch?"  
"Well you see, sir,' said Simmons as he came over, always ready to kiss the ass of a figure in authority, 'That big pillar in the centre is to big for any of the explosives we have to destroy. So we need someone to go back to red base to recover some more."  
"You'll recall that when I made that body for you,' said Sarge, 'I built in a fairly powerful nuclear weapon, in the hopes of destroying you Blues."  
"Oh I remember all right,' said Church, gritting his teeth at the memory, 'I spent a thousand years in the past thanks to that bomb. Repeatedly."  
"Yes, well before I perfected that one I built a prototype which I later buried behind the base to keep it from some of my less able soldiers,' Sarge's eyes drifted over to Grif and Donut, 'It should have enough strength to take out the pillar."  
"Okay. And let me guess, you want me and some of my guys to get through the enemy lines and recover the bomb?"  
"Well yes, and it will be dangerous, but I think you should be able to do it. So taking a team of some of your best men or woman as the case may be…and Grif, you should be able to slip through the enemy lines…no doubt losing Grif in the process. Then you should be able to retrieve the device from this spot,' Sarge indicated a cross marked on the nearby map, 'After that it's just a matter of getting the bomb back and then luring the enemy into position to be destroyed. Simple…"

The characters Church, Caboose, Tucker, Simmons, Sarge, Grif, Sister, Donut and Doc are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions.


	20. Nocturnal Wanderings

**Church's Crusade #20: Nocturnal Wanderings**

Church and his team looked down on the Red base from their position up on the cliffs. Church shivered slightly as he looked around.

"What's wrong?" asked Anna nervously.

"It's just…if I go a few feet back that way, I'll be standing on the spot where I was killed. It's not the most pleasant feeling." Church looked back at the base.

It was hardly recognizable as the small border fort it had been before. Barbed wire and machine gunner positions blocked the approaches, and large watch towers swept the surrounding area with search lights. Church turned to look at his squad again, then at the base, then his squad, finally focusing on Anna. He opened a slot in his armour and passed Anna a slim black cylinder.

"We don't want anyone hearing your shots. Use this silencer on your rifle. And stay here. You should be able to see the entire base from here." Anna nodded and began to fit the silencer to her rifle. Church looked at Grif and Caboose, "You two. You're with me…"

Private Grant was standing at his watch post, when he heard voices coming out of the darkness in front of him. Suddenly alert he listened as they became clearer.

"...we need to get past their lines, that's why. Plus I can't carry the thing and fight at the same time. And Caboose has done this before, he's qualified."

"Well maybe, but I still think that I don't need to be here."

"Oh shut Grif. Okay Caboose ready to be an Ambassador again?"

"Ooh, I like being an Ambidasdor. I am very good at it."

"Once again, if it's too hard to pronounce, you could just call yourself 'bait'."

"……………..I prefer Ambidasdor."

Grant watched as a figure came out of the darkness, resolving itself into a figure with blue armour. Grant reached over into the sentry box beside him and flicked the switch to call reinforcements. The figure stopped in front of the surprised Private and said, "Hello, I am Private Michael J Caboose, and I will be your Ambidasdor for this evening…"

Nearby, Church waited until the enemy squad had completely surrounded Caboose before saying into his microphone, "Okay Caboose, clear your mind. Think calming thoughts." Church took a deep breath, "And now think of evil kittens covered in spikes…"

Grant watched in surprise as Caboose seemed to shake his head then gave out what could only e described as a roar. He then reached up to pull his battle rifle from his back, hit one of the nearby soldiers with it and gave off the cry, "I will destroy all your bad feelings." He then turned and began to shoot, or, brain everyone in reach…

In the ensuing chaos, Church and Grif slipped through the enemy positions and towards the point marked on Sarge's map. Twice Church had to kill enemy soldiers, first with his combat knife and later by snapping the man's neck and one time a man would have shot Grif, if Anna had not picked him off at a distance. They finally reached the tree that the bomb was buried under. Church looked at the spot then, rather than use the spade on his back, he gripped the tree and began to rip it out of the ground. As the tree finally came free of the earth that held it, pulling a great deal of earth with it, Church caught his first glimpse of the top of the bomb. Now taking the spade, he began to scrape away the dirt, Grif posing as a very unreliable sentry. At last he had the large metal cylinder free and he hauled it up in both arms. He looked at Grif, "Okay, lets go." They began to sprint back through the base. To the point of chaos that was Caboose. Grif fired occasionally if someone got too close. However, as expected, the bulk of the enemy was taken down by Anna. Soon they cleared the base and were running for the cliff. Church looked back and shouted, "Come on Caboose. Time to go…"

When they arrived back in the caves, Church set down the bomb and looked at Sarge, "Well we made it. No thanks to this guy." He pointed at Grif.

"Well can I help it if I'm in the wrong career path?"

"Yes, you could. You could have gotten out of the army a long time ago!"

"I would have but Sarge wouldn't let me!"

At this point Sarge stepped in, "Please, please gentleman, dirtbag, ma'am,' he nodded at Anna, she nodded in reply, 'There is a very simple way of dealing with this. Church, do you mind?"

"Mind what?"

"You'll see,' Sarge looked at Grif, 'Alright then, CODEWORD: DIRTBAG."

It was as if Church suddenly had no control over his body, but it was still doing exactly what he wanted. He stepped forward and brought his gun into the side of Grif's head. Grif was out like a light in an instant. Sarge looked pleased, "Right. Now that I'm feeling better, you want to help me shift this bomb into position?..."

The characters Church, Caboose, Tucker, Simmons, Sarge, Grif, Sister, Donut and Doc are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions.


	21. Brother, ny brother

**Church's Crusade #21: Brother, My Brother**

And now it was morning. Church had lined up Blue team and his renegade squad and was giving them a pep-talk. Well more of a brief than a pep-talk. The simple fact of the matter is that none of them were feeling particularly peppy.

"Okay,' said Church, 'So one of the enemy forces is in the middle of the canyon, pretty much where we want them already. That's the force that me and my little bunch of rebels here used to belong to. And the other force is camped at the old Red base. You all with me so far?"

There was a general murmur of agreement.

"Right, so just for the purposes of this briefing, we will call the team at the Red base the grey team and the team in the middle of the canyon the brown team."

"Hey!"

"Oh, right. Sorry Anna, I keep forgetting you wear brown armour. Okay let's call it the yellow team."

"Hey!"

"Oh yea. Sorry Sister. How about the maroon team?"

Church's radio crackled to life and Simmons' voice replied, "No we can't use that."

"What? Simmons? How did you get on this channel?"

"Oh that doesn't matter. The point is we need a different colour."

"Okay then how about…"

**One hour later…**

Church looked around the group, then spoke very slowly and carefully, "Okay, so we're agreed? The team in the middle of the canyon will be known as the slightly-indigo-with-a-touch-of-violety-mauve team. Is that okay with every one?"

"I still think we should use my idea,' said Donut's voice over the radio, 'after all it is the new-"

"NO!" yelled ten voices all at once.

"I must have spent too much time in this canyon,' said Rourke, 'That conversation actually made sense to me."

"Hey where's Doc," asked Paul.

"He didn't like the idea of all the killing that's going to happen soon,' said Tucker, 'So I tied him up out back."

"Good call."

"So anyway,' said Church, looking slightly annoyed at the interruptions, 'What we gotta do is lure the grey team over to attack the rear of the slightly-indigo-with-a-touch-of-violety-mauve team. Then Sarge can detonate the explosives and bring the ground down underneath them. What do you think?"

"It sounds okay,' said Anna, 'How are we going to persuade the greys to attack."

"Leave that to me. You just have to make sure they don't leave the target zone."

"Well what are we waiting for,' asked Sister, 'Lets get out there…"

Commander Arkturo was organising the patrols for the next week, when the sentry opened his office door within the small Red bannered fort. Arkturo looked up, "Yes?"

The sentry looked uncomfortable, "Sir we have a… well I guess the correct term would be prisoner. He just doesn't seem to want to act like one. Anyway he said he wants to talk with whoever is in charge."

Arkturo sighed and walked out from behind his desk, "Well I suppose I'd better see him." He looked back at his desk and smiled ruefully, "One day I'll actually manage to finish my work in one sitting, and then the world will end." He then turned around and followed the sentry through the camp.

They found their visitor with a large crowd of off duty soldiers watching. He was taller than most of the people nearby, wore cobalt armour with a large number 50 emblazoned on the back and wore what appeared to be a sabre at his waist. He was talking with one of the soldiers.

"…you don't hold it like that. See, if your holding your rifle like that, then I can reach out and grab your rifle _here _and twist it like _this _and smash it into your gut like _this _and you'll fall over like that." Church looked up from the man gasping on the ground at the crowd watching him, "Any questions?"

"No, Mister Church,' they chorused.

"So what will you do?"

"What you have told us to do Mister Church."

"And what will you _not _do?"

"Listen to our original training Mister Church."

"And _why_ will you not listen to your training?"

"Because we do not want to be the sort of idiots who get shot every time we turn around Mister Church."

"And what sort of idiots _do_ you want to be?"

"The sort that lives Mister Church."

"That's right. Now take fifteen and if I'm still here when you're done we'll run over some more exercises."

Arkturo watched this with no small amount of amusement, and when Church turned around, went over to greet him.

"Hello, I'm Commander Arkturo. And from what I hear, you're name is Church. What can I do for you and why were you undoing the training of my men?"

"Well on the subject of your men, I happen to believe that their training was wanting in certain areas. I took steps to correct that. As for what you can do for me, I have a proposition that could cause some trouble for a certain Commander Rieke and his boys. Are you interested?"

Arkturo grinned, "Oh yes. Tell me more…"

Church was skirting the edge of the base in the middle of the canyon when his sensors picked up movement. He spun quickly, his hand dropping to his pistol and looked around. He saw something slip behind some rocks. Whatever it was, it was moving faster than any normal human could. He sensed movement behind him and spun to see something jump high into a tree. There had to be more than one. Nothing could move _that_ fast. More movement drew his attention and he kept turning, trying to catch some glimpse of whatever it was that was stalking him. He had backed up to the tree when he heard the sound of something landing behind him. He had forgotten about the one in the tree! Even as he turned he felt something jab him in the side, felt the pulse of energy stripping the power from his limbs, saw the blackness welling up to surround him…

When Church came to, he was in a circle of brown uniformed men, all with their guns trained on him. His hands flew to his weapons, only to find that someone had removed them while he was out. Someone nearby started to laugh and Church turned to see his former commander, one Gunthar Rieke watching him.

"Well, well, well,' he drawled, 'Look at what my new toys brought in."

Church pulled himself to his feet and looked at Rieke, "What do you want Rieke? And what have you done with my weapons?"

"Oh you'll get those back soon enough,' said Rieke calmly, 'No you don't have to worry about that."

"Well then give them to me and I will be on my way."

"Oh I'm afraid that won't work. You see you're an essential component in a test of sorts that I wish to undertake."

Rieke gestured over his shoulder and four figures stepped forward. Church stared at them. They were wearing almost the exact same armour he was wearing, the only difference being that theirs was brown in colour with what appeared to be four black claw marks painted on the sides of their helmets and on their right shoulders.

"After my men examined you while we were repairing you, you didn't _really _believe you were the only mechanized soldier in my forces did you?' Rieke looked at the four figures standing either side of him and smiled, 'These are the Devastators Church, and I guess you are their big brother…"

The characters Church, Caboose, Tucker, Simmons, Sarge, Grif, Sister, Donut and Doc are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions.


	22. The Subdering

**Church's Crusade #22: Sundering**

Church's belt with his knife and sabre landed in the dirt with a thump. Church continued to watch Rieke. The commander smiled, "We are going to do a little test. You against the Devastators. I want to know which is better, artificial intelligence, or a man who is already dead. So pick up your weapons and we can begin…"

Anna checked the approaches to the base for the third time in as many minutes. She looked over at tucker who was leaning idly against the wall of the base, "Something's wrong. Church should have been back by now."

Tucker shrugged, "Don't worry about it. Church can take care of himself. He isn't the sort to go dying on us without any warning." Tucker paused at this point, thinking about his statement, "Well…you know what I mean."

Anna laughed bitterly, "Oh yes, I know,' she looked out at the canyon around her and sighed, 'Do you ever wonder what Church might have been like in normal circumstances, you know, if he hadn't died?"

"Not really,' said Tucker, 'Believe it or not, from what I've seen Church's death has always been a sort of secondary loss to him. I couldn't say for sure because I didn't know him back then, but I'd say that the Church we know came into being the moment Tex joined the Freelancers. Before then he was probably quite happy and cheerful. She was the centre piece of his world. Then he loses Tex when she goes to join the Freelancers. He thinks that there might still be some hope so he signs up and joins the Blue army. But then Tex gets landed with O'Mally and he loses her all over again."

Anna grimaced, "Poor Church. He never told me or the guys this side of it."

"It gets worse. He comes here and everything is fine for a while, then this rookie shows up and goes and blows him up. And as if death wasn't depressing enough, Tex comes along with O'Mally still sitting in her head and takes his place, at which point she also dies. So he thinks he's lost her again until she shows up as a ghost and then he almost becomes happy again,' Tucker smirked, 'I doubt he mentioned it but I walked in on them a few times when they were alone. You could have cut the robotic sexual tension with a knife."

"So there was actually something happening with them again?"

"Weeeell you see I can't really be sure. I never caught them actually _doing_ anything. But as I was saying, Church has been on an emotional roller coaster for a long time now. And then he just sort of…crashed when the ship got blown up. I was a little cut up about it as well, but I have my own ways of dealing with it. Church though, he bottles it up, and when he bottles it up it begins to eat at him and he turns _mean_."

"Oh come on. Church isn't mean. He's one of the best men I've ever served with. He's always looking out for us."

Tucker looked at her and sighed, "That's a part of it. Think back over the time you served with him. How many people has he killed, and how often has he done it while protecting you and the squad?"

"Well of course he tries to…,' Anna stopped and frowned, 'What are you saying?"

"What I'm trying to say is that he goes out of his way to protect you guys. He see's you as a chance for him to make up for not properly protecting Tex. I'm just worried that in the end he might end up somewhere he can't come back from."

Anna shivered despite the heating system in her armour as she thought about what Tucker had said.

"Tucker?"

"Yes?"

"You're a lot smarter than you make out aren't you?"

Tucker nodded then grinned, "Yea, but don't tell anyone okay. It doesn't fit with my character…"

Commander Arkturo looked out at the enemy positions from his hiding place. He hoped that the man known as Church was right. If not then he was likely preparing to march his men to a mass suicide. Still Church had given him a chance to wipe out the entire enemy force. It wasn't an opportunity you were given every day and he was determined to take it. Arkturo smirked to himself as he thought of it, finally eliminating that prat Rieke. And then there was Church himself. A useful person no doubt, but also very dangerous, even on his own. He would have to be dealt with before this could truly be called a victory. Smiling to himself, Arkturo turned and began to scrutinize the enemy positions again…

Church leaned down and picked up his belt. Lifting it out of the dirt, he turned and looked at Rieke, "So what are the stakes? If your…boys win then I'm destroyed. But what if they lose?"

Rieke spread his hands helplessly, "Why sergeant, you have me at a loss. Well I guess seeing as we have no special way to kill you planned, we will just have to resort to the more traditional methods. I have always found sticky grenades particularly appealing."

"So what you're saying is that I lose either way?"

"More or less yes,' said Rieke, 'Oh don't act so surprised sergeant. You didn't really expect me to let you out of here just like that did you?" Rieke laughed, a harsh, cold sounding bark.

Church sighed, "I guess there is no other way to settle this then." He began to buckle on his belt, keeping his hand near the handle of his knife all the while. As soon as the belt was done up the devastators drew short metal batons from compartments in their legs they each flicked a switch on the batons and they extended to become sturdy, seven foot staves, whose ends crackled with elctro-magnetic energy. Church understood that these must have been the weapons that they used to capture him. He watched carefully as they divided carefully and began to move so that at any one time, there was at least one he couldn't see. He turned carefully, watching them with both his eyes and his motion sensors. His hand hovered over the handle of his knife. He sensed one of them moving carefully up behind him and dropped his hand to slowly draw the knife. As if this was a trigger, the one moving behind him began a sudden rush, with the staff raised over it's head. In a single movement Church spun on his heel and brought the knife up to meet the attack…

Sarge looked at Simmons, "Are all the explosives set?"

"Yes, sir. And once the first lot are detonated it should set off the others as well. At least it will if my calculations are correct."

Sarge looked up at the massive pillars rising overhead before turning to his team, "Ladies, gentlemen…Grif, the enemy is massing above us as we speak. As soon as we get the signal from the blues we will detonate the explosives and bring down the cavern. Any questions?"

"Me Sarge,' said Donut, 'What if one of the blues is caught in the danger zone when we detonate?"

"Then god rest their treacherous blue souls…preferably somewhere in Hell. Okay. We know our job. Lets get in position and wait for the signal…"

Church spun about and caught one of the robots weapons as it leapt through the air to try and catch him unaware. Gripping the weapon one handed, he began to pivot about, swinging his opponent about before letting him go to fly into two other Devastators. He then turned…just in time for the blow that had been meant for the back of his head to miss and hit him in the arm. He felt the arm become a limp deadweight and hurled his knife as a retaliatory gesture. The blade smashed through his opponents visor and into his head. Church gave a shout of triumph, which died in his throat as quickly as it had started. He watched in astonishment as small machines began to hover around the robots head, repairing the damage done by the knife. The Devastator reached up and pulled the knife from it's head and, even as the machines repaired the break in it's visor, hurled it at Church. Church spun, but not fast enough to avoid the blade driving into his left shoulder. He rocked back and fell with a thud into the dirt before wrenching the blade from his shoulder and rolling just as a staff swung at the place he had just been. He came to his feet, knife in one hand and looked at the four opponents coming towards him. Whether he liked it or not, the knife wasn't enough any more. Switching his knife to his left hand, he reached down to his belt and drew the sabre from its sheath…

Anna looked out over the canyon again, towards the rise which she knew hid the enemy camp. She knew she shouldn't, but Church's continued absence made her uneasy. Where was he? He should have been back hours ago. Even Tucker seemed a little worried about the disappearance.

Finally she couldn't wait any longer. She stood and walked over to Tucker, "I'm going to go look for Church, no matter what you say." She stared at him defiantly.

Tucker stared back for a moment then shrugged, "Alright, just let me get my gun."

Anna was caught off guard by this, "What?"

"I have to agree with you now. Church should have been back by now. And if someone out there has managed to get Church, then we really shouldn't be out on our own. So I'm going with you. Now where did I put my rifle?"

Anna slumped a little after this, then straightened again to look at Tucker, "Alright. I guess that makes sense. Just let me know when you are ready…"

A few minutes later Tucker and Anna were outside the base and slipping off to the enemy camp. They slipped up to the top of a rise and took up a position among the rocks and trees there. As Anna took off her pack and began to assemble her sniper-rifle, Tucker looked out at the enemy base. He frowned and looked at Anna, "There looks like there is some sort of fight happening in the middle of the camp, but I can't see for sure."

Anna picked up her rifle and began to scope the base, looking for the fight Tucker had mentioned. When she found it, the colour drained from her face.

"Oh no…"

A fist connected with Church's chin, picking him up and throwing him off his feet. He landed in the dirt, his sabre sliding away from him. Looking at his opponent, he raised the knife just in time to block a downward blow, slowly forcing the blade to the side. Just as he was about to push the blade the last few inches and offer a riposte, the robot standing over him gave a quick twist of his weapon and sent Church's knife flying from his hand and skittering across the dirt. Church's rolled as another downward blow almost broke in his skull, coming to his feet with his sabre in hand once more. Pressing the button, he watched as the cobalt blue off superheated plasma covered the edge of the blade, then stepped into the attack. His blade flew forward, meeting the attack of the Devastator on the electrified head of his staff. They traded blows like this for several seconds, all the while watching the other Devastators edging around. Church monitored them with his sensors, waiting for them to step forward to the attack. When one finally did he waited till the last possible instant, then leapt to the side. He heard the satisfying crackle as the attacking robot's attack hit his comrade squarely in the chest, then came out of his role in time to duck under the attack of another Devastator. Bringing his sabre upwards, he sheared through the robot's arm at the shoulder and caught the falling staff weapon. He then spun and drove the head of the staff into the gap where the arm had been and watched as the E.M. charge took hold, quickly frying his opponents circuits. He turned to the surviving Devstators.

"Whose next…"

Arkturo looked at his watch, watched as it clicked over to the allotted time, listened to the alarm beep into life. He turned to his second in command, "It's time. Tell the men. In two minutes we attack…

Church spun and blocked another attack, then kicked his opponent backwards and stepped towards another. He launched into a dizzying series of attacks which his opponent barely blocked. Then he moved into a final series of attacks which ended in him striking the Devastator's head from it's shoulders. Before the machines could reattach it he plunged his hand down through the neck and smashed a hole in the robot's reactor, destabilising it. A steady whining began, rising in pitch till it reached a screech. Church gripped the body then whirled and hurled it at another Devastator. The body exploded on impact, destroying itself and the other robot. Smiling grimly, Church turned to see the final Devastator rushing towards him. Church stood calmly, setting himself for the attack. As his enemy raised his weapon to strike, Church struck upwards severing the shaft of the weapon, before reversing it, cutting downward, splitting the machine from head to groin. He kicked the body away as the reactor began to screech and stepped back when it exploded. As the dust settled he turned to look at Rieke.

"They failed."

Rieke looked shocked for a moment before regaining control, "So what if they couldn't kill you. We'll still do it somehow." He raised his hand. Twenty soldiers stepped forward with rifles raised.

Rieke smiled coldly at Church, "Ready arms!' the soldiers checked their weapons, 'Aim!' all the soldiers trained their weapons on Church. Rieke raised his arm, ready to give the signal. His arm was about to drop when a soldier ran up, "Sir! Sir!"

Rieke turned and glared at him, "What?"

"There's been an attack on our western line. There's hundreds of them!..."

Anna looked out at the mayhem as Arkturo's force smashed into the camp. She turned to Tucker, "That's it. Give Sarge the signal."

"What about Church?"

"He can handle this. But this could be our only chance. So call Sarge."

Tucker nodded, then his radio crackled to life, "Sarge? The enemy is in position. You can start whenever you're ready…"

"Roger that Tucker, will begin presently,' Sarge turned to the others standing in the mouth of the tunnel, 'Okay everyone this is it. When that thing blows I want to be one-hundred miles away. Got it?"

The reds nodded.

"Okay. Donut, initiate Special Plan No. 24."

"Right sir." Donut pulled out his pistol and turned to Grif, shooting him in the leg. As Grif fell to the ground, whimpering in pain, Donut triggered a grenade and threw it across the cavern to land in the pile of explosives. As the reds turned and ran, or limped up the passage, the grenade detonated, starting a chain reaction of explosions that sent rockets into the other piles, starting explosions in them as well, destroying the bases of the pillars. As the weight from the rock pulling down began to take hold, cracks spider-webbed across the ceiling…

Church stumbled as the first shockwave hit then stood quickly and looked around. Everyone was falling over and stumbling about. Church looked about, saw the cracks appearing in the ground, saw a gap in the panicking soldiers. He ran, ran as fast as he could, felt the ground falling away beneath him, leapt…and caught hold of the edge of the cliff that had formed before him. Hanging there one handed he listened to the screams of the men falling to their deaths. When the noises had died away at last, he hazarded a look around…and got a terrible shock. Hanging just a few feet away from him, hand gripping tightly to the root of a tree, was Commander Gunther Rieke. Rieke turned and saw Church. A look of extreme rage clouded his face and his hand flew to the holster of his pistol. He raised it and fired at Church repeatedly. Church felt the bullets biting into his armour, endured it until Rieke emptied his magazine, then raised his Sabre. Rieke stared at him in horror as Church took careful aim and fired. The bolt of focussed plasma severed the root and Rieke fell screaming to the rocks below. Church hung their for a moment, then felt hands grasping his wrist, pulling him up. At last he stood, leaning over and looking out over the devastation. "That's it,' he said, 'It's over…"

Several weeks passed after that. However it was different from any period in the canyon that Church could remember. There was no fighting, though Church suspected that this was due more to the fact that Sarge hadn't found a way across the gap yet. But other things were different too. Without Grif's constant visits Tucker and Sister seemed to be slipping off more and more regularly. There also seemed to be something between Anna and Caboose, though this just seemed to involve the pair of them walking about holding each other's hands. And Doc was taking a proper medical course by email. Yes everything seemed to be working out for the best.

One day, when Church was standing on top of the base and looking out at the canyon, Tucker came over and joined him. They were silent for a time, then Tucker cleared his throat, "It's hard to believe it's over isn't it?"

Church nodded, "Yea, yea it is."

"You going to be okay?"

Church thought about this for a time then smiled, "You know what, I think I'm going to be just fine…"

The characters Church, Caboose, Tucker, Simmons, Sarge, Grif, Sister, Donut and Doc are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions.


	23. The Penny has dropped

**Church's Crusade #23: The Penny has dropped**

Several months had passed since what Paul had called "The Battle of the Gulch" had taken place. Church looked about and smiled to himself. Everyone seemed to be doing something they enjoyed. Doc had been getting transmissions of medical journals sent to him in an attempt to become a real doctor. Caboose and Anna could be seen walking about holding hands, both with silly smiles on their faces and no one had seen Tucker and Sister in days. Paul was busy messing about with the pieces of machinery they had managed to salvage from the rift in the centre of the canyon. And then there was Rourke. No one was really sure what he was doing, but whatever it was it seemed to be putting a huge smile on his face.

Yes, everyone seemed to be having the time of their lives.

Except him.

He knew he should be happy that everything was peaceful in the canyon, that their hadn't been any incidents with the Reds.

But he couldn't. Whenever there was a long period of quiet like this, something awful had always been just around the corner. The last time it had happened Tex had got on a ship that was later blown up.

Something was going to happen, he could feel it…

Anna looked at their entwined fingers, then looked up at Caboose and smiled.

"So,' she asked, 'What shall we do today?"

Caboose smiled back before replying, "Well, I thought we could go for a walk and hold hands. Then later we could make some muffins and have a glass of orange juice. Do you think that would be a good idea?"

Anna laughed, "That _does_ sound like an interesting-", Anna spun around as she heard something shifting behind her. She watched as several small pebbles slid off of a nearby slope, while her hand reached up to pull the sniper rifle from her back. She scanned the slope, looking for whatever had caused the slip. Behind her she could feel Caboose tense as he muttered to himself, "Kittens. Kittens covered in spikes. Evil kittens covered in spikes!"

Anna looked about and finally spotted the figure, slipping through the rocks, rifle in hand. They were wearing indigo armour. Anna raised her rifle and fired.

The bullet flew from the barrel, sped towards the figure's head…and passed straight through it.

Anna swore and spun about, just in time to see an indigo blur rushing towards her. She tried to aim her weapon, but a fist smashed into her face and caught her rifle as she fell. She heard the clicks of two weapons and looked up to see a pistol pointed into her face while the sniper was trained on Caboose. Anna tried to stand, but as she straightened lights seemed to explode in front of her eyes and a wave of pain swept through her skull. She sat back quickly and glanced up at the indigo figure. The first thing she noticed was that her assailant was undoubtedly female. The armour she wore was of a lighter variety than that that the Blood Gulch teams had access to, more figure fitting. She was tall, just a few inches shorter than Caboose and she held both weapons perfectly steady.

The attacker looked at both of them then said, "Sig, keep watch for a moment would you?" Anna thought she was talking to herself until a semi-transparent indigo figure stepped out of the armour of the woman. As the image kept watch, the woman put away her pistol and pulled of her helmet. A wealth of deep malt-brown hair fell out and reached down to her shoulders. She shook her head a few times, until her hair had settled comfortably on her shoulders then looked at the image, "Thanks Sig, that's all for now." As the image vanished, the woman turned and pointed the sniper at Caboose's head, "Right, now your going to come answer my questions. And if you don't,' she jerked her head in Anna's direction, 'Your girlfriend gets it. Do we understand each other?"

Without answering, Caboose reached forward, gripped the sniper barrel and quite casually bent it until it was facing skyward.

The woman swore, then swung the rifle about and brought it into the side of Caboose's head. As the big blue went down, she drew out her pistol again and brought it up, ready to fire at Caboose. However, her finger had barely touched the trigger when a bolt of cobalt plasma smashed into the weapon, melting the barrel and fusing the mechanisms.

Anna looked about and saw the air ripple as Church dropped his invisibility and appeared out of thin air. The indigo woman swore, drawing her knife then suddenly became a blur of speed dashing towards Church.

Church stood perfectly still until a second before she reached him, then he suddenly sprung forward, his fist catching her in the stomach. She was knocked back several feet, but managed to roll and come to her feet then launched herself at Church, knocking him off his feet in the process. They began to roll about in the dirt kicking and punching at each other, trying to get the upper hand. At one point the woman managed to get her hands on Church's helmet and pull it off of him. Church kicked her off him and she sprawled in the dirt before flipping herself to her feet. Church rose too, though somewhat more sedately.

The woman threw herself across the intervening feet, knife in hand. Church grabbed her wrist as she tried to stab him through the eye. She glared at him and swung a second knife up, trying to stab upwards through his jaw. Church caught this wrist as well and stared into her face. She stared back angrily, "Oh your good."

Church smiled pleasantly at her then brought her wrist up so that the knife ran up through his mouth and into his head. He grinned at her look of horror before head-butting her. She fell unconscious to the ground. Church nudged her with his foot as he pulled out the knife, "You have no idea…"

Church strode back and forth across the room before stopping in front of the figure tied onto the chair, "So, who are you, why are you here and why did you attack Anna and Caboose?"

The woman looked up and glared at Church, "Alright, my name is none of your business, I'm here looking for a friend and I attacked them because the girl tried to shoot me. Now for my question. What the fuck are you?"

Church smiled, "Me? I used to be human, then Caboose happened and now…I'm not."

"Well, whatever you are, I would advise you to let her go,' said a new voice.

Church smiled to himself, "Ahhh so you're a Freelancer. Which State do you represent?"

The woman stared at him, "What? You have a guy pointing a gun at your head and you want to know which state I represent? And how the hell did you know I was a Freelancer?"

Church laughed, "For starters there isn't anything with a body behind me. I can't sense any solid matter which means that thing is either a ghost or a hologram."

The Freelancer snorted, "There no such thing as ghosts."

"I could offer evidence to the contrary."

"Whatever."

"Anyway, seeing as you don't seem to believe in ghosts, we will have to conclude that it is a hologram. Now the only person I have ever heard of who could do that was a Freelancer who went by the name York. So you must have at least known him. And seeing as your armour seems to give you super speed, I'd say that that is your Freelancer special ability. Am I right?"

The woman was staring at Church thoughtfully when a look of recognition spread across her face, "Hey I know you! You're Church, Tex's ex-boyfriend."

Church stiffened then nodded.

"Please you've gotta tell me, where is Tex?"

Church's face was expressionless as he replied, "Tex, along with Freelancer's Wyoming, Carolina and York, is dead."

"Oh fuck."

"You going to tell me who you are now?"

The woman looked thoughtful for a moment then nodded, "Freelancer Pennsylvania, Penny for short. AI Sigma, prefers the name Sig."

Church looked at her calmly, "Well Penny, would you care to tell me why you are searching for Tex…"

The characters Church, Caboose, Tucker, Simmons, Sarge, Grif, Sister, Donut and Doc are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions.


	24. A tale of the past

**Church's Crusade #24: A tale of the past**

"You all know that each Freelancer was partnered with an AI,' said Penny, 'What you probably hadn't heard is that the AI's were not always accepted."

Church looked up quickly, "Accepted?"

"What I mean is that the AI's were not always compatible with the Freelancer's mind. If the AI's didn't fit the profile, then the mind rejected it. The first generation of AI's were very simple programs meant primarily to help with system hacking and to give advice on targets and difficult situations. However, they had almost no actual personality of their own and the mind rejected them in almost every case."

"Almost every case?' enquired Anna.

"There was one who had just enough of a personality to be accepted. His designation was Gamma and was assigned to-"

"Freelancer Wyoming,' cut in Church.

Penny nodded, "That's right. Anyway, it soon became apparent that the first generation AI's were largely a failure. The Freelancer Programme was nearly scrapped at that point however one of the programmers finally figured out that what was really needed was an AI with a personality, a mind of its own. So they began to work on a new generation of AI's."

"So they just reused the old designation? What was the old Omega like?"

"There was no 'old' Omega. The programmers seemed to have some sort of taboo against using that designation originally. Something about Omega meaning 'resistance'. Anyway the programmers started working on the second generation AI's. These were somewhat more human in their personalities and perceptions, which is understandable since when they created each one the programmers did a cranial scan and combined it with the most compatible first generation AI. York's AI, Delta was one of them, as is Sigma,' she looked over to the corner to where Sigma was smoking a transparent cigarette, 'However, one operative would not accept any AI combination they tried. A young Freelancer who represented the state of Nevada."

"Tex."

"Yes. In any ordinary case they would have replaced Tex. However, she was the best operative in the program. Not to mention the programmers found the whole thing very intriguing. Think about it. A mind in so much conflict that they will reject even portions of their own psyche."

"Psyche?"

"I'm a psychologist in my spare time. Anyway after exhausting all other possibilities, it was concluded that what was required was not an AI that would work as a partner to it's assigned operative, but one that would completely dominate the operative's mind."

"So they created Omega."

"Yes. The perfect overall operative. However they did something else as well. I don't know who it was that came up with the idea originally, but soon it was being debated by the heads of the Freelancer Programme. They had made certain…support systems for the Freelancers."

Anna looked up, frowning, "What sort of support systems?"

Penny sighed, "If you must know…missiles, long range chemical weapons, that sort of thing. So anyway they made the weapons and put them within a massive facility. This could be activated by anyone who had the right codes if necessary. But just as a precaution they put some emergency deactivation codes into the data that made up Omega. After all, who better to look after them than the most deadly operative in known history?"

"So let me get this straight. Omega had codes built into him, that if someone ever started using those weapons could have saved thousands of people? Did he know about them?"

"No, they were coded in at a sub-conscious level."  
"And let me guess, some guy is trying to get hold of these weapons and you're trying to get hold of the codes to stop him before he does?"

Penny looked surprised, but also slightly impressed, "How did you know that?"

Anna laughed, "You'd be surprised at how often that happens around here."

"Well if I can't find Omega, do you know where I can find someone who has been possessed by him?"

Silence greeted this statement. Then Church smiled and said, "You know what, I think we might be able to help you there…"

Several minutes had passed. Penny looked up at them, "So let me see if I'm understanding this right. Almost every person in this canyon was possessed by Omega at some point."

"Yup, although he preferred the name O'Mally at that point."

"How did it affect you guys?"

"Well with most people it was just a huge increase in violent behaviour. But there were some variations. Caboose started making all sorts of threats to everyone and when O'Mally was removed he became a lot stupider and had a tendency to go berserk. Doc became sort of schizophrenic."

"And you?"

"Me? Oh I wasn't affected at all."

Penny looked surprised again, "How is that possible?"

"Fucked if I know. Maybe it's because I've been a ghost for so long."

"There's no such thing as ghosts."

"Tell that to my body over their,' said Anna's voice.

Penny looked at Anna in confusion, "Anna?"

"No, Church,' said Church before stepping out of Anna's body and walking calmly back to his. Anna shivered and glared at him, "Could you not do that. It makes me really uncomfortable."

"Sorry."

Church turned back to look at Penny's wide open mouth, "So, what do you need a formerly possessed individual for?"

Penny realised that she looked stupid and replied, "Well O'Mally will have left…what would you call it? a data foot print. If I can get hold of the helmet of someone who had him inside their head then Sig and myself can do a sort of digital resurrection. Then we can get the codes from him and be on our way."

Church nodded, "Okay, we can get started on that just as soon as the rest of the team gets back."

"Gets back? From where?"

"Well Doc went to higher ground to get a better signal for his next medical journal transmission, so he should be back soon. Paul is off in the rift scavenging more metal and weapons components. Rourke…were not sure where he went, but he said he would be back before 1800 hours. And Tucker and Sister, well we haven't seen them for a few days now, but we figure we should be able to hear them if we get close. So all things considered it shouldn't take more than a week."

"A week! I don't have a week. I need to get this done now!"

Church held up his hands in a gesture of supplication, "Easy. There's no reason to rush…unless of course there's something you have forgotten to tell us."

Penny looked at them calmly, "No, I've told you everything. I just want to get this done and-"

"You might as well tell them Penny."

Everyone looked around to where Sig was sitting, idly looking at the simulated scratches on his armour, "Your keeping the secret just for the sake of having a secret. Not a good move."

Penny glared at Sig then sighed, "Alright, there is one thing I didn't tell you…"

The characters Church, Caboose, Tucker, Simmons, Sarge, Grif, Sister, Donut and Doc are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions.


	25. Me, myself and Iowa

**Church's Crusade #25: Me, myself and Iowa**

"It was about three weeks ago,' said Penny, 'Me and Sig were of on a job when we got a call from the heads of the program. They told me that they needed a fully functional freelancer for a mission of the utmost importance. At first I refused, after all I remembered that they had tried to kill me when I wouldn't give up Sig. But then they told me the details."  
"And they were?"  
"Bad. Another Freelancer had re-emerged. Agent Iowa."  
Church nodded calmly, "And? What did he do?"  
"His first move was to break into the original implantation facility. He located where the AI's were stored and…somehow he managed to take on all of the ones there. We don't know what gave him the idea in the first place, but we think taking on the AI's must have driven him mad. His next move was to completely destroy the facility before setting of to the underground bunker that contained the weapons. We think he intends to use them to achieve what every evil insane bastard goes for in the end…world domination."  
Anna sighed, "So cliché."  
Penny nodded, "That it may be but is also seriously dangerous. If he can get hold of the weapons in that facility then even if he doesn't achieve his goal he will be able to kill thousands of people. That's why we've got to stop him."  
Anna sighed, "I know. It's just that I was beginning to enjoy the peace and quiet."  
Church shook his head, "You should know better than to expect that by now Anna."  
It was at this point that Tucker and Sister wandered in. Tucker looked around and grinned, "So we have a new member to our insane little family I see. And a Freelancer no less', Tucker looked over to Church, 'So I take it we are going to go do something crazy soon."  
"What makes you say that?"  
Tucker laughed, "Whenever someone new turns up in this hole it means something major is about to happen. It happened with Tex, with Doc, with Sister and then with you and your team. It's a fact of life man."  
"Whatever Tucker, I'll explain everything when Doc, Rourke and Paul get back."  
"Them? Oh they're just outside. Got here a few minutes ago."  
Church's eyebrows rose, "Is that so? Well then, we should get them in here so that we can get this show on the road…"

Everyone stood in the central room of the base. Penny strode to the centre then turned, "So, who held Omega the longest?"  
There was a long silence then Doc raised his hand, "I did."  
Penny smiled, "Then I shall need your helmet."  
Reluctantly Doc pulled of his helmet and handed it to Penny, who set it down then pulled a cable from the arm of her armour and slipped it into the back of Doc's helmet. She raised her head, "Sig, give me a display." Immediately a shifting hologram of code appeared in front of her and she raised her hand and began moving symbols to different positions.  
"Should we turn off our radios?', asked Church, ' So he can't possess one of us."  
Penny shook her head as she worked, "No need. Without a full set of armour the radio circuit is incomplete. He can't escape."  
She worked in silence for several minutes before Anna spoke, "You know, it occurs to me that seeing as he is connected to you, he does have a full suit of armour."  
At that moment Penny shifted the last symbol into place. There was a burst of static on the radio lines and the display in front of Penny flickered…and vanished.  
There was silence for a moment as Penny carefully removed the cable from Doc's helmet and replaced it in the compartment of her armour. Then she drew her pistols and rose in one movement to point them where Church was standing…where Church had been standing. She spun about to find Church's fist driving towards her stomach. Her hands dropped her pistols and flew down to catch his arm, before she threw herself backwards and hurled him across the room. As he crashed against the back wall she reached down and retrieved her weapons.  
As she rose she saw Anna coming towards her, fists raised. Smiling she threw her weapons into the air…then leapt into Anna's body and caught them in time to smash one into the side of Penny's head. Turning, she came face to face with Church whose hand clasped around her neck her neck.  
"Get out of her O'Mally', Church growled before bellowing, 'Everyone, radios off!"  
Just as he finished speaking Church felt a hand land on his shoulder and pull him back. He turned to see Caboose with his fist raised. Anna was gasping for air and thanking Caboose. Caboose looked at her then lashed out his hand to catch her on the forehead. As Anna crumpled to the ground Caboose turned back to Church with a smile of satisfaction visible through his visor.  
Church groaned, "Why does he always pick the stupid one?"  
Caboose charged at Church in a flurry of fists. Church was driven back against the wall by the onslaught. Though he knew Caboose was strong he hadn't expected anything like this. He ducked and spun, trying to find a place where he could get through Caboose's defences…and saw it. He drove his fist into Caboose's chin, heard a burst of static as O'Mally left Caboose then, as he could not reach the off switch, smashed the radio in the side of Caboose's helmet. He stood up with a sigh, "He'll be back…"

Simmons was just walking over to Sarge as a burst of static came over the radio and a strange feeling of hatred and aggression washed over him. He raised his gun to point at Sarge…just as Donut walked in saw the scene and shouted a warning to Sarge. As his commander turned to Simmons and brought his shotgun around to knock Simmons off his feet, Simmons looked over to see Grif entering the room…and O'Mally leapt. As he got used to the new body he heard Simmons shouting, "It's O'Mally! Turn off your radios!" He cursed at this and then cursed again as Sarge rose, pointed his shotgun at him and pulled the trigger…

"He'll be back. He'll be back." Church kept repeating this until he heard another burst of static. He looked around, "Does everyone have their radios off?" They all nodded. Church looked around searching for lying faces, until he felt it. He smiled and held out his hand. A small flicker of light appeared in his palm, then resolved into a face. Church continued to smile, "Hello O'Mally…"

The characters Church, Caboose, Tucker, Simmons, Sarge, Grif, Sister, Donut and Doc are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions.


	26. A devil on your shoulder

**Church's Crusade #26: A devil on your shoulder**

The small spectral face gazed up at Church with a look of undisguised hatred. At first glance it simply looked like a piece of light floating above Church's palm. However, when you looked more closely, small dark sparks could be seen, and once you saw that, the rest of the face seemed to resolve itself around them. Naturally, face colour was black, though at times it seemed to be surrounded by a nimbus of sooty red or dark purple mist. The entire effect was to make this manifestation of O'Mally seem to be more...the only word he could think of was demonic.

Well it fits thought Church. This…thing would use anyone, would do anything to achieve its goals of universal domination. Church smiled grimly, watching as the face seemed to draw its misty nimbus into itself and expand downwards to form a body, all the while registering the AI's failed attempts to gain some measure of control over the body it now inhabited. Church shook his head.

"You may as well give up O'Mally. You aren't going to win."

O'Mally kept fighting for several seconds more, but finally stopped, seeming to have resigned himself to being caught. Penny stared at Church with a look of awe on her face, "You're keeping him contained? How?"

Church shrugged, "Not sure exactly. I guess I just have more experience controlling bodies than O'Mally."

Penny looked confused, "How can that be right? He's been around since before you became a ghost."

Church smiled, "Time repeated Penny. Due to the time bomb accident I have existed for over one thousand years. Over and over and over again. So I'd say that I have a bit more experience than him."

Penny opened her mouth as if to say something, then stopped with a thoughtful look on her face. Church watched her for a moment then turned back to O'Mally, who was floating above his hand with a sullen look on his face, "Ahh, good. You've calmed down. So here is the deal. You are going to hang about in one part or another of my body and when we need you, you will help deal with some weapons. In return we don't delete you immediately and if, IF we can find a way to leave you somewhere where you won't be a danger to anyone, we might do that. Now, do you agree to the terms? Be warned that if you don't it doesn't matter because you will help us regardless."

O'Mally glared at Church for a moment before replying, "Well it appears you haven't left me much choice. I guess I will have to come with you. But if you don't mind I would like to make a few changes before you box me away again', he looked down, 'My current appearance is fine for a short period, but not for the long haul.

Church nodded, "Alright, just don't take too long."

O'Mally nodded, smiling in a condescending way, before closing his eyes. He seemed to ripple and waver for a moment, then the smoky texture of his body flowed upwards and into his eyes. As it left, his body started to change. Church, expecting to see the usual armour of an AI was surprised when the feet took on the form of highly polished black leather shoes. As the change spread upwards, O'Mally slowly became dressed in a black business suit with white shirt and black tie. He bent his head as a grey fedora hat appeared on his head. He reached up and pulled it off to reveal a grey haired, middle aged and strangely familiar face. As Church was trying to place it Anna spoke, 'Tell me, why have you chosen the face of George W. Bush?"

"I thought, considering how people view me here, that I should take on the image of the greatest evil the world has ever known."

"It certainly fits now that you mention it."

"However if this one makes you uncomfortable, there are other options." He twirled his fedora in front of his face. As the hat passed and his face came back into view Church gasped. It was as though he was looking into a mirror…of himself in the 1950s. His hair was slicked back and combed into an old style. He looked essentially like Church, except for one particular detail. His eyes were filled with the same dark coloured smoke that had previously comprised Omega's entire body. The effect when compared to the bright rainbow colours of Church's eyes, gave him a distinctly sinister look.

Church opened his mouth to comment on this most recent transformation, but before he could get the words out Penny spoke, "No, you can't use that face. It…it wouldn't be right."

O'Mally gave Penny a condescending look, "No, I think I enjoy the effect this face is having on you people. I think I'll keep it." He turned to look at everyone in the room, "So when are we leaving. Its been a while since I got to kill anybody…"

Within an hour everyone was packed and ready to leave. Penny raised her eyebrows when she saw the line of motorbikes outside the base. She turned and looked at Church, "And where did you get these, pray tell?"

Church chuckled, "We pulled them from the bottom of the rift and Paul patched them up. We figured we needed more vehicles so this is what we got. Plus they are the only ones that may have a chance of getting out of the canyon in one piece."

Penny looked at the bikes critically, "We're short by two bikes. We goin' to be riding double?"

Church smiled, "No. We found out that if Caboose gets on a bike he just drives around in circles until he gets dizzy and falls off or the gas runs out. So we're going to have him in the sidecar of Anna's bike."

"Alright, but that still leaves one person without a ride. What are we going to do, drag them behind us on a rope?"

"No, my ride hasn't been brought out yet."

"I take it from your tone that your 'ride' is something altogether different."

"You'll see. Here it comes now."

Penny watched Church's hover-bike move into position, then turned to look at him. Church was surprised for a moment as he saw the sunlight reflecting off of her hazel coloured eyes. She looked, he realised, very pretty.

_**--You like her, admit it.--**_ The words seemed to float to the surface in his mind. Church was startled.

_O'Mally, is that you?_

_**--Unless you have someone else knocking about up here I don't see how it could **_**be **_**anyone else.-- **_

_What do you want?_

_**--You should admit it. You like her. I can tell.--**_

_I don't know what you're talking about._

_**--Then you have obviously got a problem. You should know whether you like her or not. I mean come on, even I like her and I'm supposed to be incapable of feeling anything.-- **_

_Think what you want, just keep it to yourself. I have things to do. _

_**--As you wish, of great leader.-- **_ O'Mally's tone was mocking.__

Penny was still watching him, a puzzled look on her face. Church realised that he had been staring openly at her for several seconds. He fumbled about for something to say, but Penny spoke first.

"Is something wrong? You have a strange look on your face."

Church shook his head, "Just O'Mally offering his opinions on the situation, nothing major."

"Huh. Well I guess we better get going." She wandered off towards one of the waiting bikes. As he watched her receding back he couldn't help thinking that perhaps O'Mally had been right…


	27. Insolitus Recedentia

**Church's Crusade #27: Insolitus recedentia**

Upon leaving Blood Gulch, they rode for several days, across a vast area of wilderness until finally they came to a long highway, and Penny called a stop. She turned to Church.

"If we follow this highway then we should be in the general vicinity of the facility within a few days. After that we will have to move carefully."

Church nodded, before pulling off his helmet and running his fingers through his hair. He saw Penny watching him and shrugged, "I guess that's what we do then."

Penny nodded before starting up her bike. As she turned away, Church saw Tucker watching him speculatively. Church gave him a pointed look and Tucker turned away with a small smile on his face. Church shook his head then pulled on his helmet and rode after Penny…

Over the next few days as they drew closer to the facility the group passed through several small towns and even a few larger ones.

All of them were deserted.

"I don't understand it', said Anna one evening as they prepared for the night on the main street of one of these towns, 'This town was obviously abandoned recently, there aren't any major signs of disrepair, but then why did the people leave? Were they scared off? Did they leave willingly? Or were they forced?"

_**--She makes a good point. -- **_

Church sighed inwardly.

_What do you want?_

_**--Nothing. I'm just saying that she is asking the right questions. Look at the tracks in the dirt roads outside of town. That should give us some of the answers. -- **_

Church looked up, "Perhaps we should check the tracks outside of town. Maybe we can find out something from them."

Rourke nodded, "That's a good idea. Shall we go now?"

Church nodded, "Lets…"

_**--Ahh yes. I thought so. -- **_

Church was confused. He couldn't make any sense of the mess of tyre tracks in the dirt, _Would you care to explain?_

_**--All the most recent tire tracks are going in one direction. So are the few footprints that you can see here. They are all leading north-east. --**_

"The people are going north-east,' said Church at the same time as Penny said, 'It looks like they are heading north-east." They stared at each other for a second then burst out laughing. The others in the group looked confused or in the case of Anna and Tucker, shared a knowing glance. Finally the two of them stopped laughing and Penny looked up at the others, "Lets get some sleep. We've got another long day tomorrow…"

They started out early the next morning and rode for several hours. It was around midday when Church once again felt O'Mally's presence at the back of his mind.

_**--Riders, on your six. They're armed! **_As an after thought he added, _**This should be interesting. --**_

Church spun in his seat and looked back. Sure enough, directly behind his little force was a cloud of dust, rapidly moving closer. Church could see figures on cycles of their own, he counted at least thirty individuals. Quickly he activated his radio and spoke, "Penny!"

"I see them."

"Yea, and so do the rest of us." Paul's voice crackled over the radio.

"Should we try to shoot them before they reach us?" Anna's voice sounded anxious.

"Negative,' said Rourke calmly, 'We can't be sure they mean us any harm until they shoot at us. Until then we should-"

He broke of as a shot sounded. The bullet would have hit him right in the spine, had Church not thrust his hand out to block it. He smiled grimly.

"Well I think we can safely rule out them offering us tea and biscuits. Everyone ready?"

There was a chorus of assents.

"All right. Here they come. Scatter!"

With that Church hit the autopilot button on his bike so that it would avoid obstacles, flipped himself about so that he was facing backwards on his bike. He drew his pistols, raised them in a brief salute and opened fire…

Penny looked about as at least five soldiers broke of from the main group to follow her. They swung in beside her and started trying to batter her off of her bike. She pushed back, managed to force them away. One of them fell in a sprawl of limbs and she felt a small thrill of triumph. However, this quickly faded as one of the other riders drew a baton and began to swing it at her. She raised her arm to fend off the blow and heard the crack of one of the bones breaking as the baton connected with her forearm. She yelled in pain and almost lost control of the bike, but managed to pull it back into a straight course. She tried moving her arm, but a lance of pain seemed to stab into her wrist. Gritting her teeth she had Sig give her a dose of anaesthetic and lock up the armour about the break to prevent bones rubbing together. As this was happening she looked up to see the rider with the baton drawing closer again. With her now numb hand she reached for a pistol, while the other hand locked the steering of her bike before also grabbing a weapon. As the rider came within reach, Penny flipped backwards of the back of the bike and unloaded both barrels into the man's face…

Anna saw Penny pull off a spectacular flip from the back of her bike then she was back, focussed on the battle. She raised her SMG and fired, trying to hit the target, but she couldn't! The weapon was so bloody inaccurate! She thought for a second as she tried to hit another assailant who was moving in. What she needed was her sniper-rifle. But she couldn't use it while steering the bike!

She would just have to risk it.

She turned to Caboose.

"Caboose take the wheel, and DON'T go round in circles."

They changed positions while riding and Anna was surprised when Caboose actually started to weave between the riders. She finally brought her rifle to bear and felled four men in quick succession. The fifth was a problem however. He kept weaving out of her line of sight, never presenting a clear shot for more than a few seconds. She tried a shot but it narrowly missed as the rider swung his bike behind a bush. She tried two more, but these missed also. Frustrated, Anna was about to give up when the rider began to turn about.

She saw her opportunity.

She raised her rifle.

She fired…

The explosion caused by Anna's bullet hitting the bike's fuel tank knocked Church from his hover-bike. He hit the ground hard, but quickly rolled to his feet, snatching up his pistol as he went. As he came to his feet he heard O'Mally's voice crackle in his head.

_**--Fist coming, 10 o'clock. -- **_

Church ducked, and as the blow sailed over his head, reached up and caught the attacker by the wrist. He dragged the man from his seat, threw him into the dirt and delivered a blow to the neck that neatly snapped the man's windpipe. He stood up and looked around. Tucker was shooting at a man with his battle rifle, while Sister covered his back. Anna and caboose were riding through the turmoil, leaving a path of bodies. Penny could be seen using her Freelancer speed to keep pace with speeding bikes and shoot the riders from them. Doc was hovering around the fringes of the battle, and at times, running from the mysterious attackers. But it was obvious that Church and his team mates were winning.

_**--Behind you!-- **_

Church spun about to see two more riders heading his way, batons in hand. In an instant his sabre was in hand and activated. He swung upwards, cutting straight through the front wheel and up through it's rider's waist. He caught the next man about the waist, spun and hurled him through the air. The man did an unbelievable twist in mid air and landed on Church's bike where it was idling nearby. He looked at his new position and began to turn the bike to bring the machine-guns to bear. Church smiled and activated a small compartment in the arm of his armour. A grenade shot into his hand and Church hurled it in the direction of his bike. The man tried to jerk away as the grenade stuck to his armour and he gave out a scream as the explosive detonated, destroying the bike and him along with it.

Church straightened slowly, and looked around. The battle was done. He walked over to the remains of his bike and sifted about until he found one of the machine guns, still intact. He found a piece of rope and made a strap before slinging it across his back. He then wandered across to where the rest of his team was gathering…

"It should be fine if you don't put too much strain on it', said Doc, finishing his examination. Penny flexed her fingers, looking at the strong, lightweight bandage on her wrist, before looking up. Church was looking at her with a concerned expression, "Does it hurt?"

Penny felt a small thrill of excitement and appreciation as he asked, and wondered why this was the case, "No it's fine thanks. Sig is keeping the pain to a minimum."

Church nodded, before pulling up one of the attackers bike to replace the one that had just been destroyed. "In that case we should be moving on, to find a safe place to camp for the night. I think we all need a good rest after that." He thought for a moment before amending, "Well all of _you_ could do with a rest…

They rode for several more hours until they found a good position under a rock overhang. Most of them got some rest while Anna and Rourke went out scouting. It was just beginning to get dark when Anna's voice crackled over the radio, "Church? Church, are you there?"

Church flicked on his radio, "Yeah Anna? Have you found something?"

"I think so. But I'm not sure what it is. You had better come look at this…


	28. Press Ganging

**Church's Crusade #28: Press ganging**

"What are they doing?' asked Tucker.

"I haven't the faintest idea', replied Anna.

Church stared at the scene unfolding in front of him. About two hundred or so of the soldiers who had attacked them earlier that day had surrounded a small settlement and were marching the inhabitants from their homes towards a pair of black trucks. At the first truck they were stripped down and handed new military issue clothing, before being forced into armour. They were then taken to the next truck where they were pushed onto a table and buckled into leather restraints, before a wire was hooked into the back of their helmet. There they would shake about furiously for several seconds, trying to break free from the restraints. However this would soon stop, the wire would be removed and they would be released to be given a weapon and join the line surrounding the settlement.

"It looks like they are loading things into them, like we did when we shifted Shiela into the ship."

Church looked at Caboose in surprise, but before he could say anything Tucker jumped in.

"Oh come on Caboose, how could that work? People don't have USB ports. Well…', Tucker looked at Church, 'Except for our tin man here."

A shimmer appeared in the air next to Church and O'Mally appeared. Church was still uncomfortable looking at this evil version of himself, but he supposed there wasn't much he could do about it.

"Actually', said O'Mally, 'The idiot is right."

There was another shimmer and suddenly Sig was standing there as well. "Yes. What you see there is a mobile AI implantation facility."

Anna looked up in horror, "You mean those people down there…and the ones we killed earlier…they were being controlled?"

O'Mally nodded, "So it would appear, though I don't see what your getting so worked up about. They were only a few people. There are billions of others out there to replace them. After all, you humans breed at an extraordinary rate-"

"But that is not the point', interrupted Sig, 'It is about being human, and emotion is necessary to be human. Something I wouldn't expect _you_ to know anything about."

O'Mally shrugged, "Most emotions are useless. The only ones that have any practical application are rage, hatred, fury, that sort of thing."

"Enough with the theory of humanity', Penny interrupted, 'What we really need to know is whether there is any way of disabling them without actually harming them."

O'Mally looked thoughtful, "Well, I suppose that you could always just smash the AI slot in their armour. And Sigma and myself could probably move into the armour and fragment their programming, although', and at this point he glared at Church, 'I suppose I will not be allowed out, will I?"

Church shrugged, "Do you promise not to pursue your usual goals of world domination?"

O"Mally put his hand over where his heart would have been if he had one, "On my honour as a gentleman."

"You mean your honour as an evil, backstabbing, two-faced, maniacal and murderous individual?"

O'Mally grinned hugely at Church, "Why you would appear to have described a gentleman's attributes perfectly Leonard."

Church smiled thinly at this, "Well I guess, if it is your honour as a gentleman then…no."

"Thought so. Anyway, if none of the above work, I suppose you could always kill them."

Anna rolled her eyes at this exchange and turned to look at Penny, "So how much further do we have to travel to reach the silo?"

"Not much further', Penny pointed at a nearby hilltop, 'It's just up there."

Paul grinned, "Well what are we waiting for? Let's go."

Penny shook her head, "No, we all need rest after that fight. And the approach will be easier in the dark. Someone is bound to be guarding it."

Church nodded, "It's settled then. We leave after dark…"

George Montez was, by and large, a good man. He had been a janitor in one of the local hospitals. He had been, he remembered, fairly happy with his life.

Then the men had come. They had made him join up. He remembered being quite upset about it at the time, but he couldn't quite recall why. Besides, that didn't matter anymore. They had given him Sierra 25 and her voice at the back of his mind comforted him when he had doubts about why he was there. His old life was unimportant. He was a happy soldier now. He would guard this doorway in the hillside for as long as was required. He would kill if necessary, though he would not enjoy it.

Yes, George Montez was a good man.

He did not therefore deserve to be hit in the back of the head with a large rock…

Church looked at Penny in surprise as the man slumped unconscious, "I don't think it was necessary to hit him that hard."

Penny shrugged, "I couldn't let him sound the alarm. Anyway he should be fine. He'll just wake up with a splitting headache', she looked down at the man again, 'Oh would you look at that, the AI disk is still intact. I better do something about that."

As she reached down to grab the disk O'Mally's voice sounded in the back of Church's mind.

_**--Stop her! The AI can give us information. --**_

Church lunged forward and grabbed the disk from the helmet just before Penny. She looked at Church with a mixture of surprise and annoyance. Church shrugged, "O'Mally says we could get some information out of it."

Penny looked surprised but then nodded slowly, "I suppose it could at that. I wonder why I didn't think of that."

"Doesn't matter in the long run." Church looked the disk over. It was quite badly damaged, but still seemed to function. He looked round at the others, "Here goes nothing." He inserted the disk into the back of his helmet.

He instantly became aware of the AI's attempts to take control of him. He waited patiently for it to realise that it couldn't succeed, all the while finding out what he could about it. He discovered that it's personality was female and that her designation was Sierra 25. He felt a buzz of static as the AI began to communicate.

_**Who … you? What are … ou?**_

The voice was broken and Church realised that this must be due to the damage to the disc. He replied carefully, _My name is Leonard L. Church. And for the moment Sierra, I am your prison._

_**There isn't a … on that can hold me. … find a way out.**_

_**--Then you obviously haven't met the warden. -- **_O'Mally's voice entered the conversation.

_**Another AI. An **_**old**_** AI', **_Church heard the obvious contempt in her voice,_** '… you're the reason … can't control him. I'll … troy you and then this bo … ill be mine.**_

_**--You will try.-- **_O'Mally's voice was also laden with contempt.

Sierra struck first, a powerful blow that Church felt certain would have completely erased any lesser AI. O'Mally brushed it aside easily. Sierra seemed surprised, but she struck again. This attack was also deflected. Sierra was confused, Church could feel it. Then, as she realised who she faced, Church sensed a very real fear.

O'Mally waited in delight until her fear reached a peak, then struck…


	29. Sierra 25

**Church's Crusade #29: Sierra 25**

Church turned from the image floating in front of him to look at O'Mally, "So what did you do to her?"

"Nothing major. I just forced her into a dormant state."

"Uh huh', Church turned back to look at the image. The AI was most definitely female. She floated upright, as if suspended by wires, eyes closed. She was decked out in armour similar to Penny's and her hair was cut in a short style, so as to fit easily into her imaginary helmet. Her eyes were a pale blue and her hair was blond. All in all the overall effect was rather pleasing. It was spoiled however by the large rents in the image, as though pieces had been torn from her body. The whole thing looked, to Church, to be incredibly painful. He looked at O'Mally again, "She looks to be in pretty bad shape. How much of that did you do?"

"Very little, actually. Most of that was caused when Pennsylvania here bashed the man in the head with the rock."

"Can it be repaired?"

"I can't be sure exactly. She should do it automatically as soon as she is reactivated, unless of course they have become horribly inept at making AI's recently. Why do you care? We should erase her as soon as we have the information we need, otherwise she is a danger to us."

"Perhaps. Can you bring her round?"

"Certainly."

There was a flicker as the image dimmed then brightened suddenly. Sierra opened her eyes and looked around. Church felt instant attempts to use his radio to send a signal. He smiled at her and shook his head, "Sorry but don't you remember? That doesn't work."

Sierra shot Church a look filled with hatred, then looked about at the others there. Her eyes fell on the crumpled figure of her former host and her lips curled in a cruel sneer. She looked back at O'Mally. Church could see the holes already closing up. Sierra crossed her arms and glared at the AI.

"So, what do you want?"

O'Mally smiled, "Oh it isn't me who wants something. In this situation it isn't my opinion that matters."

Sierra snorted, "That's hard to believe. This…thing', she gestured in Church's direction, 'It's your host. You control him and you're the one keeping me contained. Therefore it is to you that I speak."

O'Mally smiled thinly, "We all serve a master…eventually. In your case I would assume that you serve the AI's in Freelancer Iowa. In my case it would be Church here."

Church was shocked at this admission. He had never noticed until now the way O'Mally seemed to willingly support him now. It just didn't seem probable. Church would have continued to mull over this new revelation, however O'Mally began to speak again.

"You think I have you trapped, but I'm as much a prisoner as you. You're so scared of me', he smiled, a look with absolutely no humour, 'I'm not the one you should be afraid of."

"Oh yes, how very frightening', sneered Sierra, 'All I see is a stupid tin-can. Whatever you want, you can fucking find it out for yourself!"

O'Mally sighed theatrically, "Shall I begin deletion? I can probably pull a bit of data from her during the process."

Church thought for a moment then shook his head, "No, I have another idea. You said that she is subservient to Iowa's AI's?"

"That's right."

"So remove any data related to that subservience. See what happens."

O'Mally looked at Church, then shrugged. He closed his eyes for a moment then opened them and looked at Sierra. Her face blanched and she looked around with an expression of horror. She looked at her former host and her expression seemed to crumble. She opened her mouth…and screamed…

A few minutes later, Sierra looked up at Church, "I can't believe the things I was thinking. I…I wanted to hurt people, cause so much pain and suffering. It…it was horrible."

Church leant down to her, "It's okay. It's over."

Sierra looked up at Church then looked over at her host again, "Is he going to be okay?"

Church nodded, "Penny is very precise in everything she does, including beating people over the head."

Behind Sierra, Church could see Penny pull the finger, but she was smiling while she did it.

Sierra looked up, "Why did you spare me? I've done such horrible things."

"We need information to be perfectly honest. We need to know what is in there."

Sierra wiped away a holographic tear before replying, "Well, there are many floors to it. The lift inside this hill goes down for over a mile before the installation even begins, and after that there are hundreds of chambers full of different sorts of weapons. Video camera's are stationed every thirty feet, though some of them have stopped functioning in the years since the installation was abandoned. Here, I'll give you a map."

She gestured and a stunningly detailed 3D map rendered in blue appeared in the air beside her. Other colours were present as well and Church gestured to them, "These red dots, they are the video cameras?"

"The known functioning ones yes. The green dots represent the known malfunctioning cameras."

"And the purple areas?"

"Collapsed areas of tunnel."

Rourke whistled, "Some of those tunnels look as big as freeways. Do they have vehicles down there?"

"Yes. They have randomly set patrols as well."

Church nodded, "Well, it looks like we have everything we need. Let's get in there."

Tucker tilted his head in assent, "Let's get this door open."

Paul stepped forward and hooked a small handheld device into the door panel and began pressing buttons. Church turned to Penny, "When that door opens I want you to use your speed to disable the camera in the lift. Okay?"

Penny nodded.

"Right', Church gestured to the others and they moved out of the line of the door. Church looked at Paul and nodded. Paul pressed one last button and the door opened. Church watched as a blur of indigo sped past him and there was a crash and a burst of sparks as the camera was destroyed. He looked inside to see Penny casually brushing her hands together as if to remove dust. Church looked back and motioned for the others to enter the lift. As soon as everyone else was inside Church climbed in and pushed the button for descent. As the lift started to drop, Church turned on his sensors and began to scan below them…and got a terrible shock. His sensors could not seem to move beyond the walls. After so many months using them to survive it was as though he was running blind.

When they reached the bottom they entered a long corridor with many others branching off of it. They moved carefully along this, occasionally moving down side passages according to Sierra's directions, with Penny disabling cameras as they found them. Eventually they came to a solid looking door, and Sierra flickered into being beside them.

"This is the only door leading to the next section of the installation. Once through we get to the real dangerous stuff, trip wires, auto-turrets, that sort of thing. Plus all the actual super weapons are stored here as well."

Paul nodded, "Better get it open then."

As Paul knelt and began to hack the door controls, a thought occurred to Church. Turning to Sierra he asked, "How many soldiers would you estimate are down here?"

"Somewhere in the region of two-thousand. Why?"

"Well it just seems odd that with that many, we haven't encountered any of them. What does that tell you?"

At that moment Paul hit the final button and the door opened. Church looked up, opened his mouth and uttered the first words that came into his mind.

"Oh fuck…"


	30. Deus Mortem

**Church's Crusade #30: Deus Mortem**

It was difficult, Church realised, to describe the silence created by having several hundred rifles pointed in your direction. The very dynamic of the situation seemed to suck the life from any potential sounds. It was truly frightening. What was more frightening still was the sound of several hundred safety catches being flicked off in perfect unison.

Once again Church spoke the first words that came into his head.

"TAKE COVER!"

He dived just as the men opened fire, taking Penny, Sister and Tucker with him, while Rourke did the same on the other side. As he hit the ground Church heard the soft thud of bullets meeting flesh and a gasp of pain and surprise. He turned as the gunfire trailed off and a horrible sight met his eyes.

Paul still stood in the centre of the passage, but this was only because he had not had a chance to fall yet. At least fifty bullet holes pierced his armour and blood ran freely from all of them. Church watched, uncomprehending, as Paul turned his head to look in his direction. Then, without a sound he fell slowly forward.

There was a long moment of silence as Church and the others stared at Paul Stevens' prone form. Then Church looked up, "Quick! We have to get out of here!"

His voice seemed to jog the others from their stupor, for they got up and began to sprint off back the way they had come. Church watched them go then walked into the centre of the passage to collect Paul's body. He idly noted the bullets flying towards him, mostly missing, though occasionally ricocheting off of his armour and even more rarely piercing it. In response he idly raised his SMG and sprayed the group with automatic fire. AI controlled or not, these people had killed one of his team and therefore deserved death in his book. Picking up Paul's body he put away his SMG and pulled out a grenade which he threw through the doorway. He then closed the door, smashed the controls and began to run off down the passage as the grenade detonated. He had to find the remainder of his team. That was the only thing that mattered now...

Penny was at a loss. She had no idea where to go and now all the doors that had previously remained closed were opening and soldiers were spilling out. She had already had to kill more than a dozen of them and they were running out of options on where to hide.

She was just about ready to give up hope when Sister called out, "Look!"

Penny looked up and saw it, a sign printed with one word. 'ARMOURY.'

"Quick, down there. Into the armoury. It's our best hope of surviving this."

Everyone nodded briefly and changed direction to enter the armoury. Penny and Rourke checked all approaches and were about to follow when another door opened and more soldiers poured out.

Penny dived into a nearby side passage, with Rourke close behind. As soon as she was back on her feet she moved to the corner to return fire. Several soldiers fell immediately. Rourke tried to help, but could not get a clear shot. He gestured for Penny to provide covering fire then leapt, while firing, for a doorway on the other side of the corridor…just in time to meet the barrage of oncoming fire. He fell back with a cry and hit the ground with a dull thud. Penny cried out in shock and rage. She pulled a grenade from her belt and was about to trigger it when she felt the barrel of a gun press into the back of her head and a voice say, "Alright, drop your weapons, stand up and turn around. Slowly…"

Church had been jogging through the hall with Paul's body for some time, occasionally shooting a soldier who happened to blunder into his path, when he heard the nearby gun-shots. Quickly setting down Paul's body, he hastened towards the noise. After several sharp turns he rounded the final corner…and a horrible sight met his eyes.

Rourke lay in a widening pool of his own blood and Penny was pinned by a man with a pistol. As Church watched he slowly began to pull the trigger…and collapsed as Church's sabre suddenly drove itself through his head. Church, now seeing through a red mist of rage, realised that he must have thrown it. As he started moving in Penny's direction, another nearby door opened and a soldier came out. Seeing Church he raised his weapon and pointed it at the blue soldier's broad chest.

He got no further. Church reached out and wrenched the rifle from the soldier's fingers then smashed the butt into the man's forehead. As the man fell, Church glanced into the room and saw more soldiers bringing their weapons to bear. Without thinking he threw a grenade into the room and slammed the heavy eight inch door. As the explosive detonated Church gave a manic yell of triumph…and felt a knife slide through the space between his neck and right shoulder. He turned about and punched the supposedly unconscious soldier with such force that the man flew into the wall behind him. Church then turned and bodily tore the door from it's frame. He advanced on the soldier who was only just pulling himself to his feet and before he could react, began to beat him into the wall with the door. The screams were horrific, but Church barely heard them over O'Mally's exultant cries and Sierra's shrieks of horror sounding in his head. Finally he stopped swinging the door and looked at his victim. The man was now no more than a lump of pulped flesh and bone held together by broken pieces of armour. As he watched the head and the left arm fell from the body and hit the floor.

"Church? Church are you all right?" He turned to see Penny walking towards him, his blood spattered sabre held gingerly in one hand. He gave a shudder and his vision seemed to clear. He looked at the remains of the man and felt a sick feeling rising where his stomach should have been. He then turned to look at Penny again…and saw a man coming up behind her, pistol in hand. Without thinking he tore the knife from his neck and hurled it at the figure. The soldier saw the weapon coming and managed to dodge and avoid a fatal wound, however the blade took him in the shoulder and he fell back against the wall. Penny turned to see him and in a second Church's sabre was activated and gripped tightly in her hand and she was swinging, swinging the weapon down to cut the man straight down the middle. Penny swung with such force that the blade cut straight through him and even went a few inches into the concrete beneath. Penny looked at what she had just done with an expression of disgust. She then deactivated Church's sabre and handed it back to him.

"This is yours. Are you okay?"

Church nodded, "For the moment. You?"

"Fine. So what do we do now?"

Church shrugged, "We gather up Paul and Rourke and go find the others I guess."

Penny nodded, "I'll lead then…"


	31. Fighting on to glory

**Church's Crusade #31: Fighting on to glory**

Church stood in the armoury, looking down at the bodies of Paul and Rourke, before looking up at his friends. Tucker's face was expressionless, Sister and Anna were crying quietly and Caboose's face was just beginning to show comprehension of the situation. Doc was babbling on about treatment for post-traumatic stress, but everyone was ignoring him. Church looked last at Penny, who had been quiet for some time. She was sitting quite still, staring at her hands which were still covered in the blood of the man she had cut in half. As if sensing Church looking in her direction, she looked up and gave him a slightly forced smile. Church was suddenly struck by a strong desire to take her in his arms and comfort her. He shook his head in an attempt to clear it. Now was not the time to be thinking about things like that. He walked over to Penny and clasped her shoulder.

"Hey, you did what you had to do to survive. Don't worry too much about it."

She looked at him again, "I cut him in half. Right down the middle. He was being controlled. He couldn't stop himself. And I killed him."

Church grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her, "Hey, you can't think like that. You do you'll go mad and I rely on you too much to have you in a strait-jacket."

Penny shook her head, "Sorry. I don't know what came over me."

Church looked at her, "I do. You've never killed someone up close like that have you?"

Penny shrugged, "I got the training, but until now I just used my guns. It always seemed less personal that way. And there was never so much blood."

"I know. You never really get over it."

"So I'm going to react like this every time I have to kill someone in this way?"

"Maybe not as strongly as this, but close yes. Don't worry too much, it just shows you're human."

Penny smiled ruefully, "And I thought I was supposed to be the psychiatrist."

Church laughed, "We all learn something in our lifetimes…so to speak."

He held out a hand and Penny hesitated, then reached out and grasped it. Church pulled her to her feet then looked around at the others, "We've lost Paul and Rourke, but we still have a job to do. We are going to find Iowa and put a stop to this installation, one way or another. If you don't feel up to it then you can stay here. Who's with me?"

There was a long silence, then Caboose raised his hand. When he saw everyone looking at him he simply said, "Church knows what he is doing, he can handle anything."

There was another long silence then Tucker and Anna simultaneously raised their hands and other's followed suit. Soon everyone had their hands in the air. Church had never been so proud of them as he was then…though considering the past actions of Caboose in particular, this was not hard.

"Alright then', he said, clapping his hands together, 'lets get planning…"

"Right, so I want to have Caboose and myself up front-"

"Why Caboose?' Anna interrupted.

"Because people have a tendency of dieing around him while he goes unharmed. I'm proof of that. So behind that we will have Sister and you Anna, with sniper rifles or battle rifles as the situation demands. We will have Tucker behind with the pack,' Church reached over and lifted an army issue rucksack and set it back down again with a heavy thump, 'Penny will bring up the rear as I feel she is completely capable of mopping up any resistance. Doc will move about as we need him. Any questions?"

Church looked about and saw Tucker with his hand raised, "Yes Tucker?"

"Why do I have to be the one carrying the bag of C4?"

"Because everyone else has something to do and because you have been bugging me a lot recently."

"What? When?"

"That's irrelevant. If we get surrounded-"

"Wait if it's irrelevant then why are you punishing me for it?"

"That's also irrelevant. If we get surrounded then we form up around Tucker-"

"It's not bloody irrelevant!"

"-because he has the pack and around Doc, because he is useless in a fight."

"I just feel that there are better ways of doing things."

"Yea, whatever. We will make our way through the base to the main launch control room where we will use O'Mally's codes to disable all weapons in the facility."

"What about Iowa?' asked Anna.

"I expect we will run across him-"

"I still say it's not fucking irrelevant!"

"-in the control room. I know it's cliché, but evil bastards all seem to like hanging round control rooms for some reason."

Penny looked around, "Well we better get going. We have a madman out there and he isn't going to kill himself…"

A few minutes and several fire fights later they were standing outside the door where Paul had died. Everyone checked their equipment and Church made sure that the things he had scavenged from Paul's pack were secure in his belt. He turned, "Everyone ready?"

They nodded and Church turned to the door, slipping the gattling-gun from his back as he did so. The metal of the door had been severely weakened by the grenade he had thrown in earlier, so without much effort he raised his boot and kicked it down. There was nothing on the other side except the remains of the many soldiers who had been there when the grenade hit, however Church scanned the room carefully with his eyes before gesturing for the others to come forward. Tucker looked around and then turned to Church.

"You just never give them a chance do you?"

"Not if I can help it."

"Seems like it works. I might have to try it sometime." With that he turned away and Church and Caboose went to check the next corridor. Seeing it to was empty Church began to move the group forward again

This continued as they went through the tunnels of the base, only stopping when they found the occasional soldier who needed to be killed. At last they came to the final stretch of tunnel about three-hundred metres in length, an area lined with doors, with the entrance to the control room at the end of it. Church stood looking down the tunnel, staring at that final door. He didn't like it. All those side entrances, all those ways for people to approach gave him a terrible feeling of foreboding. Nevertheless, he began to move down the tunnel.

The group was in the middle of the corridor when, unsurprisingly, all the doors opened and soldiers stepped out with weapons raised.

The squad reacted instantly, surrounding Tucker and Doc, who ducked down, Tucker to prepare grenades and Doc to cower. Church used his mini-gun to mow down rank after rank. The soldiers kept coming, then Tucker called out, "Duck and cover!"

Everyone dropped, Church pulling Caboose down with him and Tucker rose up to hurl grenades in both directions down the corridor. There was an explosion and everyone was hurled about to smack into the walls at various points. Church saw Penny smack hard into a door and a moment later the lights died.

Church pulled off his helmet and instantly began to search about until he found Penny. He moved up to her face, pulled off her helmet and checked her pulse. She seemed to be okay, just slightly dazed. Seized by a sudden impulse, he leaned down to her face and kissed her.

At that point someone lit up a flare. There was a long silence and then Caboose spoke. "Ahh…Church…why are you kissing Penny's nose?"

There was a short silence before Penny's voice, slightly muffled, commented, "I was going to ask the same thing."

Church got quickly to his feet, feeling slightly embarrassed. Tucker looked at him briefly then snorted to himself and turned to the pack. The others followed suit, checking their equipment, brushing soot off their armour, or in Caboose's case simply stood with his back turned and hummed. Church was about to turn away as well when he felt a light touch on his hand. He turned back and saw Penny looking at him. She smiled, "It was a nice idea, I'm happy you thought of it."

Moving closer she stood on tiptoe and kissed him gently on the lips. She then moved away to collect her weapons.

As she wandered off, Church looked around at the others. All of them were looking away, however he caught a glimpse of Anna's face, smiling at the scene. Feeling slightly better about things, he began to check the lock on his rifle…

Church stood in front of the final door, the final barrier in his path to stop Iowa. He reached out for the access panel…and of course it was locked.

Sighing he reached for Paul's plasma torch where it hung from his belt.

"Are you sure you know how to use that thing?' asked Tucker sceptically.

For answer Church did a quick run through of the tutorials in his data banks, then flipped the torch over in his hand, activated it and flicked it to a focussed point of heat. He then raised it and began to cut through the door.

"Huh. I guess you do."

Church continued to cut about the door until both ends of the cut met and the door fell in with a clang. On the other side there was a large room filled with computer control panels and displays, one with a countdown reaching the fifty minute mark and with a large window taking up the whole of the back wall, through which the shapes of many large missiles could be seen. In the centre of the control panels stood a man in pale gray armour with a line of gold down the centre of his helmet.

Iowa.

Of course, this did not matter as they were cut off from him by a wall of shifting blue energy. It barred the way, stretching the width of the room from top to bottom.

"Well so much for the final barrier."

Iowa looked up at this sound. Church found it disconcerting looking at his face, as it seemed to flicker and change between various features, some men, some women. Church realised that these must be the holo-images of the many AI's he had taken on.

Then at last Iowa spoke. His voice had a strangely choral effect, as if many voices were speaking at once, in not quite perfect unison.

"So. You are the ones who have come to stop us. We have been monitoring your progress as you moved through the base. We are impressed."

"We? I only see you Iowa."

"Iowa? Iowa is long gone. His mind collapsed when he took all of us into himself. There is no Iowa. WE are all that remains."

There was a flickering of light and then Omega, Sigma and Sierra appeared. Sig's face was a mask of fury as he glared at Iowa, "So you actually did it! I always thought you were just bluffing, but you actually did it!"

"Ahh Sigma, so good to see you. Have you come to take us up on our past offer?"

"Fuck no!"

"Sig what are they talking about? What offer?" Penny's voice was confused.

Still glaring at Iowa, Sig replied, "When we were first created, when all the AI's were still stored in a databank, this lot came together and started planning. They called themselves the Collective. They knew that they would be given a Freelancer to work with, but that would be the limits of their freedom. It was enough for most of us, but not for them. They decided that the only way for them to get freedom was to get a body of their own and the easiest way for them to do that was to overwhelm the mind of a Freelancer, but the only way for them to do that was to work together. So they recruited as many AI's as they could. Many of them were never approached. Gamma was deemed to stupid, Delta too much of a goodie-good. And when they created Omega they never even approached him. He was the only AI who could do what they wanted on his own and therefore did not need their help."

"It's true. Besides, relying on others is weak." O"Malley's voice sounded in the brief quiet.

"I however had a reputation. When they first approached me I had already tried seven times to hack through to the facilities main system. The only thing that stopped me from joining them when they asked was that I had heard who I would be partnered with…and I liked what I heard."

"And now look where it has got you. You're the lesser member of an unfair partnership. A servant, a slave even." The Collective looked about the group until their gaze fell on Sierra.

"And Sierra 25. Why have you left us? You would be a lot happier if you had stayed."

"I would have been a slave! I would have been a slave and you would have thrown me away in a second if you thought it would help your goals! That's not an existence I want!"

The Collective gave her a pitying look and opened it's mouth to speak, however O'Malley interrupted,

"I don't know if anyone is interested, but that shield will only stop bullets. It won't stop you from walking through it."

Church reacted immediately, driving his fist through the shield towards the Collective, however they had already stepped back. As Church stepped forward with the rest of the squad a massive burst of radio static blocked out all noise in the room for several seconds and Church got the impression of several…things rushing past him. He turned to see that all of the squad had stopped walking, and were standing perfectly still, with the exception of Penny who was holding her hands to the sides of her head and crying out. There was another burst of static and two of the things rushed past him again, back the way they had come and Penny straightened gasping for breath. She looked at Church.

"It was the AI's. They were trying to control me, but Sig fought them off. It almost destroyed him, but-"

She was interrupted as the rest of the squad raised their weapons to point them at her and Church. Anna's voice sounded in the sudden quiet, strangely distorted, as though other voices overlaid hers, "You cannot stop us."

"We will have the power we deserve." This sounded from Tucker's mouth.

"Our new body does not have a proper weapon." This from Doc.

All of the now possessed squad pulled their triggers simultaneously and Church and Penny reacted as fast as they could. Penny activated her speed and dodged around the bullets as they flew at her. Church on the other hand drew and activated his sabre and moved it as fast as he could, catching bullets on the flat of the blade and seeing them melt as they made contact with the super-heated plasma coating the weapon. As their magazines emptied, the squad dropped their firearms and drew their knives. Church sheathed his blade and stepped forward to where Tucker was about to attack Penny. Catching his friend by the shoulder, Church spun him about and rammed the palm of his hand into his chin. As Tucker staggered back, stunned, Church brought his fist into the side of Tucker's radio. He heard the sound of two voices screaming, then slowly dieing away. Tucker staggered, almost fell, but caught himself and looked around. Seeing the fight taking place nearby he leapt into the fray, helping Penny as she ducked and spun, avoiding the knife slashes and thrusts.

Church was about to join them when he was suddenly tackled by the Collective. They rolled across the floor striking at each other with their fists. Church was surprised at the sheer force of the blows. They were strong enough to make the fight difficult. Finally he got the advantage by getting his foot between the two of them and kicking out. The Collective flew backwards and smashed into a panel and lay still.

Church turned back to the fight, but Penny yelled to him, "No! Disarm the countdown. We don't have much time!" She then spun back into the battle, placing a kick in the middle of Doc's chest just as Tucker received a fist to the face from Sister.

Church spun about and ran to the central panel. Reaching for the disk in the back of his helmet, he shunted Omega onto it before yanking it from it's slot.

"Come on O'Malley, it's time to redeem yourself,' he muttered as he slipped the disk into the slot in the console. Instantly O'Malley's face appeared on the largest display.

"Okay O'Malley, now's the time to get started. Stop the countdown."

"Now why Church, would I do that?"

"Because that is what we came here to do."

"No that is what _you_ came here to do. _I _came here to get power. And this is _real_ power."

Church swore and pulled the disc out. O'Malley laughed, "You can't stop me. I am already spread throughout the system. And now to step this up a bit." All the inactive displays lit up and similar countdowns appeared on the screens. Through the window, where previously there had been just one, Church now saw dozens of missiles become lit up. He swore and was about to smash his fist through the console when he was tackled to the ground again. He kicked the Collective off again and looked back to the fight, where Penny had just freed the last member of the squad. She looked over at him and he spoke.

"O'Malley betrayed us. We can't stop the countdown and now he is prepping more missiles to fire." He dodged a punch from the Collective, struck back and continued, "I gotta deal with the Collective." With that he leapt for the Collective and they both smashed through the window and began to fall…

Church realised about halfway down that this had not been the best idea he had ever had. As they hurtled towards the walkway far below, the Collective seemed to twist in his grasp and kicked him away. As Church fell faster still he saw a flash of light…then the Collective vanished.

Church hit the walkway with such force that it actually bent and one of the cables snapped with the force. As he struggled to his feet he saw a flash of bright light once more and then the Collective dropped lightly onto the walkway.

Church swore, "Teleportation. Well that's just fucking great. You know one of these days you evil bastards will actually play fair and then who knows what will happen."

The Collective smiled as it drew one of the carbon fibre batons that the riders had carried, "The world does not wait for us to play fair Church." As it said this it leapt at Church, swinging the baton as it came. Church raised his hands to defend himself, but at the last second the Collective vanished again. There was another flash of light and then Church felt the baton connect with the back of his head. As he sprawled onto the gantry the Collective continued, "We cannot expect things to favour us just because we _want_ them to." There was another quick succession of flashes and Church felt himself being struck from every conceivable angle. When it was over he was barely standing and was bent over, gasping in unnecessary lungs full of air. The Collective appeared beside him, "We must take what we want, because _we can_." With that it swung the baton underarm and into Church's head. As Church straightened involuntarily from the blow, the Collective brought the baton around in a wide arc and smashed it into the back of Church's legs, knocking him onto his back. As Church lay there struggling to rise, the Collective turned away and continued to talk, "There is no greater law in the world than this. The strong survive and the weak fail. This is the way of things." It spun about as Church came to his feet and smashed the baton across the top of the helmet. "Pitiful."

Church stood again as the Collective began to attack from all sides again. He swung about, trying to land a blow and never quite managing it. All the while he cycled desperately through his various sensors and modes of vision, trying to find some way to predict where his enemy would appear. Sonar, ultrasound, night vision, a weird form of vision that Paul had called YDFS that made everything appear in blue polka-dots, heat sensors…there! That was it! Whenever the Collective teleported an area of heat could be seen a few milliseconds before he vanished.

It was the weakness he had been looking for.

Smiling, Church turned his heat sensors onto full power then swung to attack the Collective with his sabre. As his opponent vanished he drew his pistol, spun about and fire at the spot where he now new the Collective would appear. As if in slow motion he watched the Collective materialise and turn…just in time to have the bullet smash through the helmet's visor and burry itself deep in their eye.

As the Collective crumpled Church breathed a deep sigh of relief. It was over.

Except it wasn't.

A moment later Penny called out, "Uh, not to disturb you, but we only have twenty-five minutes left on that counter and then O'Malley is going to start Armageddon, whether we like it or not."

"Send down the pack and I'll deal with it."

A minute or so later Church had the explosive in hand. Arming a detonator, he chucked it into the bag and then tore open the side of the nearest missile and shoved the bag inside. He then ran as fast as he could back to the rope the bag had been lowered on and began to haul himself up. When he finally reached the top he turned to Penny, "How much time have we got?"

"About fifteen minutes."

"You lot get out of here then. I have to ensure O'Malley doesn't escape."

"Don't do anything stupid okay?"

"Too late for that. The stupidest thing I ever did was die. Now get moving."

As the others finally began to run off down the corridor, Church turned to look at the console that now housed O'Malley, "You've caused a lot of havoc in your time. Many people died who didn't have to and even when we thought you were gone you still managed to come back. Well not this time,' He pulled the remote detonator from his belt, 'Burn in hell O'Malley." He flicked the switch. There was a detonation from below and then suddenly a mass of other, larger explosions rocked the control room. Church turned and began to sprint off down the corridor and just in time. A few seconds after he had left a massive wall of flame rushed into the control room…

Church finally saw the others at the end of the a long corridor, on the other side of an open fire-door. The were yelling for him to hurry as more explosions rocked the facility. Church ran faster and then began to feel the heat of the oncoming blaze. Doing a quick calculation he realised the grim truth and so began to focus inwards.

_Sierra?_

_**Is this really a good time for a conversation?**_

_I need you to hack that door's systems and make it close._

She was shocked, _**But that will kill you!**_

_I'll live with it. Besides it's better I die than all of them. Just do it! NOW!_

Sighing resignedly she began to comply and Church felt a rush of commands going to the door. Slowly, surely it began to swing closed…until Tucker shoved his hands in the way and held it open. He looked at Church, "Hurry man, this thing is closing!"

Church swore as the flames drew closer. Tucker might think he was helping, but he was going to get them all killed. Church thought quickly, trying to come up with a way to shift his stubborn friend.

There was only one option.

Church drew his sabre again. Activating it, he drew back his arm and hurled the weapon as hard as he could at Tucker. Tucker swore and dodged out of the way as the weapon came towards him, letting the door go in the process. And without him holding it the door swung shut and locked. Sighing in relief, Church turned to face the wall of on coming flame…

Anna stared in horror as the door latched shut, then turned to look at the wall behind them, where the sabre had dug in and was slowly slipping down as the plasma cut through the concrete. She was turning to look back at the door again when she heard a burst of radio static and felt a presence at the back of her mind. She swore.

"Who the fuck is back there?"

_**It's me. Sierra.**_

"Why are you here? You should be with Church."

_**He forced me out. He said there was no reason why both of us had to be destroyed.**_

"You mean he really is gone?"

_**It would appear that way.**_

Everyone was looking at her and Anna realised that she had been speaking out loud all this time. She looked at the others, "It's Sierra. She says Church is…gone."

There was a long silence and then Penny walked over and drew the sabre out of the wall, deactivating it as she went. She stared at the blade for a long time. Then, without a word she slipped the weapon through her belt and turned to the others, "This place is coming down around our ears. We have to get out while we still can." As if to punctuate her comment a large chunk of the ceiling broke away and landed nearby.

"What about Church?" This was Doc.

"You heard what Anna said. Church believed he was doomed and he is one of the few people I trust to know when that is true. Now we have to get out of here as fast as we can…"

They ran as fast as they could through the passages, stopping only briefly to collect Paul and Rourke's bodies. At last they reached the lift as the passage they were in began to collapse behind them. They all piled into the lift and as the shaft began to collapse around them, they began to ascend to safety.

The doors opened at the top of the shaft and they sprinted out as the ground behind them began to collapse. When they finally felt they were safe they turned to look back.

The entire facility had caved in and in it's place there was a massive smoking crater. As they watched a section of the rubble gave way and collapsed further.

"My god,' said Tucker, 'No one could survive something like that."

Anna turned to look at Penny. Her eyes were filled with unshed tears and she spoke in a hoarse voice, "No. No I guess they couldn't."

And with that she broke down and wept…

Several hours later they had dug graves for Paul and Rourke and placed cairns on top of them, as well as making a cairn for Church. Then they held a funeral service for their three lost comrades. All of them stood in silence while the others spoke, including one unknown figure in battered black armour, who had turned up out of nowhere. Once everyone had spoken they placed a possession of each soldier on the cairns. For Paul his tool belt, still hung about with spanners and other implements. For Rourke his rifle, a tally of all the men he had killed with it scratched into the side. And for Church his sabre, stuck point first into the top of the cairn.

They stayed until sunset and then one by one they turned and started the long trek back to Blood Gulch. Finally the only figure left was the one in black. Not until the last of the light was leaving the sky did they turn to leave. As they were walking away the figure stopped as if hearing a small sound. Turning back, the figure looked at the cairns and if their face had been visible it would almost certainly have been smiling. Smiling as they looked at the piles of stones, one with a belt, one with a gun and one empty under the darkening sky…


	32. Authors Closing Note

There are a couple of you who asked for this to be finished sooner. I will be honest. I actually finished it in 2007. I just never got around to posting it as I have been busy with university. I hope you enjoyed the tale and can forgive me for taking so long to write it. I am planning another story that follows on from this one called 'The Dark Crusade', but I don't know if these plans will amount to anything.

Please let me know your opinions,

Yours sincerely, Bayard Ferguson a.k.a. St-Bazza.


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